Disclaimer: I do not own Pirates of the Caribbean, I probably don't own the plot line to this story, so please don't hold me accountable for any similarities this story bears to anything else already in existence. I do, however, own Mahdis and Inara.
Author Notes: A new story…Anyway, this is the prologue to the story and it moves relatively quickly. The following chapters will move slower, but the fast pace was necessary to keep this from going on forever. This chapter contains the questionable issue of slavery. It is only featured briefly, but it's there none the less.
The Pearl of Persia
Prologue
A high pitched wail came from the slave pen as a child was ripped out of the grasping arms of her mother and carried roughly towards a group of waiting men. The little girl could not have been more than eight and sobbed for her mother, tears streaming down her copper coloured skin. One of the handlers roughly shook her in an attempt to silence her, succeeding in nothing more than making her bite down sharply into her tongue.
The sudden eruption of pain silenced her and she brought shaking fingers to touch the blood gushing over her chin. For a brief moment she was quiet, but then she lost it. She broke out into hysterical screams and cries, thrashing wildly in terrified panic. The handlers shoved her into the waiting hands outside the pen. Thick fingers slid down her arms and grasped her undeveloped side hard. She looked up at the leering features of the man who owned her body, now silent tears oozing from the corners of her eyes.
The flow of blood from her tongue began to slow and become tacky, giving her a wild appearance. She let out a cry and began to wiggle frantically in his hold, the instinct for flight taking over. He shook her harshly and then back handed her, a sneer tugging at his thin lips. She stilled in his hold, the ragged remains of her clothing hanging off her childish, undernourished body. He lecherously looked her over, touching her, before returning his gaze to the impassive handlers.
"I'll take 'er." He chortled, pressing her trembling form against his beefy one, but his eyes were now sifting through the crowded slave pen. "Bring out 'er motha. I liked theh looka 'er."
Within moments, a woman was dragged out of the pen and thrown in front of the man's feet. The little girl began to whimper and reached out to the prone female, sobbing for her mother. The woman's chest rose and fell slowly as she looked up into the terrified face of her child, but she did not try to assail her daughter's fear. There was an expression of hopelessness on her exotic face and her peculiar violet eyes were dull. The man's gaze was on her for brief seconds before he nodded to the handler.
"I'll take 'er too." He shoved the child down on to the ground and into her mother's waiting arms.
He turned back to the waiting handlers and began to conclude his business while his newly purchased slaves were led towards a back door. They were shoved into a dark wagon along with one other person and the woman immediately tucked herself into an unoccupied corner, holding her daughter close. The little girl buried her face in her mother's neck and simply shook, the comforting touch of her mother helping to soothe her panic.
There was a man sitting across from them. He was ragged and coarse looking, a wild mane of light brown curls haloing his head. He looked more like a pirate than a slave. The woman watched him warily and stroked the back of her child's head, distrust rolling off of her waves. The wagon lurched suddenly and they heard the buyer's voice rising above the bustle of the city.
The man in the wagon, a slave now, did not try to engage her in conversation but watched her with dark brown eyes, a serious expression on his features. He continued staring until they had long since left the city behind and the sharp tang of the ocean managed to seep past the dirty canvas of the wagon. Enough time had passed and the little girl had grown calm enough to slip into sleep.
The wagon went over a pot hole and jerked her awake. She blinked blearily, eyes the exact colour as her mother's, widening when the salty smell of the sea assailed her nose. She turned in her mother's lap and looked up at the older woman with an endearingly innocent expression.
"Mama, are we going home now?" She asked, her young voice unsure.
Her mother sighed quietly and tenderly brushed hair out of her child's face. "No, Inara, we are not going home."
Somehow, the little girl, Inara, found a gap in the canvas wall and pushed it open with her hands. For a moment she looked at the sparkling, roiling ocean about a mile away from the dusty road they were on. She suddenly jerked her head back in and pointed a dirty finger through the hole.
"Mama, look at the pretty boat!" She cooed. "Its sails match my hair!"
The man's back immediately straightened and a toothy grin broke out across his weathered face. He leaned forward and motioned for Inara to come towards him. Despite being sold into slavery and seeing the destruction of her homeland, she went to him with the naivety and innocence of a child. He ruffled her hair and pointed to the ship still just visible through the crack in the canvas.
"Ye won't be eh slave fer much longer, me pretty." He said confidently. "Tha' boat is filled to theh brim with pirates. They're 'ere to break me out."
She whipped her head around to look at the shadowed shape of her mother. "Mama, is he telling the truth?" She asked in their native tongue, the words flowing off her tongue like honey.
"I don't know, Inara. Come sit with me now and leave the man alone."
She obediently followed her mother's command and hunkered down in the dark, watching the man with shining violet eyes. The older woman wrapped a protective arm around Inara's shoulders and held the child close. The wagon came to a sudden lurching halt and an ominous, meaty thud reached the hidden occupants.
Panic began to return and when the canvas split cleaning and unfurled like flesh around a wound, a frightened cry erupted from the young girl. A head stuck into the wagon and a grin broke out across this person's face when he saw the man sitting nonchalantly in the shadows.
"Bootstrap!" The newcomer chortled. "I told ye we'd break ye out as soon as ye got bought. Git outta theh wagon, I think we made a little too much noise in tha pursuit of this here wagon."
Bootstrap agilely leapt out of the wagon and the pirate clapped him affectionately on the shoulder. It seemed as if the two were about to depart and leave the two worried females hunched in a dark corner of the wagon. Bootstrap turned at the last moment and looked back into the frightened eyes of Inara, a sigh escaping him.
"Jack, ye know we can't jus' leave 'em 'ere." He extended a hand to Inara and her mother. "Would ye like to come with us? We can take ye where ever ye'd like in the Caribbean."
Bootstrap received an abrupt thump from his friend. "Bootstrap, I think theh time in captivity has addled yer brain. I'm the captain of theh Pearl, not ye. I'm theh one tha' makes theh orders."
"We're not gonna leave 'em 'ere to fall back inta slavery."
"If I say we are, then we are!" The two men descended into friendly bickering and Inara's mother silently prodded her child into moving.
In the space of a few heartbeats, Inara was over the side of the wagon and running towards the tree line just as her mother told her. She had barely gotten past the first trees before a steely arm wrapped around Inara's waist and clamped her against an equally hard body. Her form stiffened fearfully and she cautiously looked up to see the strange pirate staring down at her with a bemused expression on his face.
"Ye run pretty fast fer a girl, faster'en most of the lads on me ship." He commented neutrally.
She did not respond, but a good deal of the fear drained out of her face. His hold on her loosened slightly as Bootstrap came into view beside the wagon, her mother held tight against him. Bootstrap looked over at Jack and carefully relinquished his death grip on the woman, merely holding onto her wrist now.
"She says 'er name is Mahdis and 'er daughter is Inara. She refuses to tell me any more until 'er kid is back, so it's a good thing ye can run faster than a jack rabbit, Jack." He jibed playfully.
Jack muttered something under his breath and gently pushed Inara towards her mother. The girl eagerly went to Mahdis's side and held her hand tightly. Mahdis carefully shook her wrist out of Bootstrap's grasp and looked affectionately down at her child. For a moment she didn't say anything, merely looking, and then she sighed.
"Precious, would you like to go back onto a boat and leave this place forever?"
"Are we going home?" Inara asked sweetly, excitement at returning to their home bringing a faint flush to her dark gold cheeks.
Mahdis gently broke her hold on her child's hand and wrapped her arm around Inara, forcing herself to hide her own sadness for the sake of her daughter. "No, sweetheart, we are not returning to Persia. I don't think we will ever be able to go back." When tears began to fill Inara's eyes, Mahdis crouched down before her and smiled warmly to the girl. "It's time for us to make a new home for ourselves, just the two of us. Would you like that?"
"What about Papa?"
A shadow crossed Mahdis's face. "Your father…your father cannot come with us."
"But wouldn't Papa like to be with us? He told me I was his favourite daughter…" Inara trailed off, disappointment darkening her eyes.
"You remember what happened that made us leave the palace, right?" She continued once Inara nodded. "Your father didn't make it out like we did."
"Papa died?"
"Yes, Inara, he did."
"Oh." She murmured and immediately looked down at her feet, her small fingers picking at the dirty fabric of her clothes. "I guess Papa can't come then."
"No, darling, he cannot but I'm sure he would want us to go and create a better life for ourselves."
Inara looked back at her mother and then at the two pirates standing awkwardly a few paces away. "Are they going to help us make a new life?"
"Yes, they've offered us passage on their ship to a safe place where nobody will be looking for us."
Mahdis seemed so sure that this was the right course and thus Inara let a shaky smile spread across her young face. "Okay, Mama." She murmured. "Can we go now? I don't want to stay here any longer."
Once she uttered those words, the two newly freed slaves were caught up in a whirlwind of activity. The men ushered them quickly off the road towards the ship anchored in a sandy cove. They barely had time to take in their surroundings once they boarded the boat before they were put into an unused cabin and had the door shut firmly behind them.
They were told firmly that they should not leave the cabin until either Bootstrap or Jack came back for them. It didn't matter though that they were shut up in a stuffy room, they were free now and had their new life stretching out before them.
The next two weeks passed as a blur for Inara. Mahdis spent the time either retching into a bucket or sleeping fitfully on the small cot they shared. Inara, on the other hand, was barely faced with any sea sickness and spent a good portion of the day light hours sitting up on the deck, questioning the pirates about every minute detail of sailing and life as a pirate.
The crew quickly grew tired of having her constantly underfoot and, seeing how something about Bootstrap unnerved her, she attached herself to Jack as soon as she sensed their irritation with her. For some reason, Jack did not tire of her. While he was at the helm, she would sit on an over turned bucket and watched him, peppering him with questions whenever one came to the forefront of her mind.
He was surprisingly patient with her and even let her drive the helm on occasion, always standing close just in case she needed him. Her golden skin took on a rich, milky copper colour and the slightly malnourished look she had started to adopt faded with the first week as she ate regular meals. The entire time, Jack had kept himself from asking the young girl about her past lest it would awaken traumatizing memories best left buried.
One evening while they were eating, he let her have dinner in his cabin with him, he looked at her while she happily forked fish into her mouth and finally asked the question that had been burning a hole in his head.
"Inara, where's yer father?"
She looked up from her plate and smiled widely, innocence shining from her face. "My papa's dead. He died when Mama and I were fleeing the palace."
"Palace?" He probed, interest piqued.
She nodded earnestly. "That's where Papa lived with Mama and all my aunts and brothers and sisters." She set her fork down and clasped her little hands together. "I had lots of brothers and sisters, but I don't know where they are anymore."
"Was yer father king, then?"
She wrinkled her nose. "King? What's a king? Papa was Shah."
It took Jack a second, but it clicked in his head that Shah must be the equivalent of a king. "So yer mother was theh…theh…Shah-ess?" It was all he could come up with.
She tilted her head as she thought about that. "Mama was one of Papa's wives. He had lots and they all lived together. All his daughters, like me, got ta live there too but all my brothers had to leave once they turned thirteen. I miss them." She murmured the last part, a sad look entering her eyes.
"Yer father had a harem?" Jack asked incredulously, hardly believing his ears.
She shrugged and picked her fork back up. He watched her eat for several long minutes before a smile spread across his lips.
"Ye really are from Persia, aren't ye?"
She nodded without even looking up, continuing to hungrily eat. He let the subject drop after that and Inara started up her questions again. There were many such interludes between the young girl and pirate, but it soon became time for Jack's ship to dock in the English city of Port Royal. Once the ship was moored, he helped Mahdis off the boat while her sick body tried to right itself on the land.
Inara followed obediently behind, eyes wide as she stared in soft wonderment at the numerous buildings spreading out before her. She paused a moment as she watched a magnificently dressed woman walk gracefully up a railed gangplank a few ships over, amazed at how the rich fabric of her gown reflected the sunlight as if thousands of tiny jewels were sewed into the material itself.
Inara paused long enough to lose Jack and her mother and when she looked back in their direction, her throat closed suddenly in panic when she found a sea of strangers instead of familiarity. She sucked in a deep breath and tried to fight her rising fear and started pushing through the mass of people in the direction she thought her mother and Jack had gone. A hand suddenly clamped around her arm and she let out a surprised squeak. She looked up slowly, but a happy smile burst over her lips when she saw Jack's worried countenance staring down at her.
"Where did ye think ye were goin', poppet?" He asked, concern radiating out of his dark eyes.
She slipped her little hand into his far larger one and grinned to him. "A lady was wearing a pretty dress with sparkly things on it." She craned her head over her shoulder in an attempt to catch a final glimpse of that gown. "I think she got on that ship." She pointed at a ship behind them before leaping on to another subject.
"Where's Mama?"
Jack blinked for a moment at the rapid change in subject. "Yer mam is sittin' in tha' tavern over there. She's waitin' for ye. A…friend o'mine will be takin' ye to yer new home."
"Where's our new home?"
Jack easily scooped the young girl up and put her onto his shoulders, unable to explain to himself why he felt so affectionate towards the dark skinned child. There was something in the way her face sparkled in innocent excitement or how she was so interested in everything around her. But maybe, more than anything else, it was how much she reminded him of himself when he was her age.
There was something in her violet eyes that bespoke of a yearning for something more; something that life wasn't offering her yet. He had seen that ache dissipate while she stood upon the deck of the Pearl and felt the roll of the ocean beneath her feet, the sting of the salty breeze on her cheeks.
He pointed to the hills that rose behind the town, more directly to the sprawling mansion directly in front of them. "That's were yer gonna be livin' from now on. Yer mam's gonna be a maid there and ye'll start trainin' to be a lady's maid. The guv'ner has a daughter 'bout yer age. Once she grows up, she'll be needin' a personal maid. That'll be yer job. It's a good one, many lasses like yerself would give their eye teeth fer such an opportunity."
She didn't say anything until he set her carefully down on her feet and led her into the dim interior of the tavern. "Can't I stay on the Pearl with you?" She asked softly, not wanting to be sent to the comparatively dull life of a maid.
"No lass, a pirate ship isn't no place fer a lovely little girl like ye. Yer place is in a nice mansion where ye'll be safe and taken care of fer the entirely of yer life."
Such a life sounded exceptionally dull to Inara, but she bit her tongue. She may only have been eight but she had well developed common sense. She dutifully followed Jack and sat down beside her mother, not particularly minding when her mother wrapped a protective arm about her shoulders.
Mahdis looked up at jack and smiled tiredly; worry putting premature lines around her eyes. "Thank you for your help, Jack. We owe you so much for helping us…"
Jack held up his hands in a gesture to stop her words. "Yer welcome, but ye don't owe meh anythin'. I may be a pirate, but tha' don't mean I'm 'eartless. Ye needed 'elp and I gave it to ye. Just raise yer daughter as best as ye can, she's a special lass."
Mahdis stroked Inara's shoulder and nodded in agreement. "That she is, this opportunity you are presenting us is life changing." A shadow crossed her face. "It will be very different than what we are accustomed to, but I knew the moment those soldiers entered the palace our lives would never be the same."
A matronly woman sidled up beside Jack and touched his forearm lightly. He turned abruptly, hand going to the hilt of the sword he carried, but upon seeing her face, he relaxed.
"Becky." She inclined her head and he motioned towards the two dark skinned females sitting in front of them. "This Mahdis and Inara, remember I told you about them?"
The slightly dumpy woman narrowed her eyes in appraisal as she took in the other two, not speaking for several moments until a short grunt escaped her. "It don't look like the two of 'em 'ave ever worked a day in their blessed lives."
"We haven't, ma'am." Mahdis said softly, meeting and holding the elder's gray gaze with fierce determination. "But that does not mean my daughter and I would be detrimental to the successful running of yon mansion."
Becky laughed in a surprisingly girlish way. "Ahh, she 'as spirit! Wouldnay thought a freed slave like 'er woulda kept that." She focused her gaze on Inara. "Wha' about your lass? Ye think she'll be able to work and benefit the household?"
"I'll do what I have to." Inara said, sounding far more mature than her meager eight years.
"Oh lass, I think ye'll be a good addition to the staff." Becky chortled and just like that, the two Persian women were accepted into the Governor's household.
Within a few short minutes all the loose ends had been tied up and Becky was chatting easily with Mahdis, helping the woman feel more at ease in her new surroundings. Jack stood awkwardly by the table, prepared to wait until the trio had left the tavern before returning to his ship. Inara didn't immediately follow the other two and instead stood in front of him. She looked up at him and smiled those violet eyes warm.
"Thank you for helping us, Jack." She murmured, suddenly shy.
"Yer welcome, lass."
"We won't see each other again, will we? You know, with me being a lady's maid someday and you a fierce pirate?"
"Aye, I highly doubt it."
She let out a little sigh and then reached behind her head. Her little fingers made a few deft movements and then flew to her collar to catch a hidden necklace. She pulled it out from beneath her clothes and grabbed Jack's hand. She coiled the simple cord threaded with a few ornate beads interspersed with smooth pieces of engraved copper in his palm and then covered it with his fingers.
"Don't forget me, okay?" She asked innocently, a hint of sadness tingeing her words.
"I don't think I'd ever be able to forget ye, lass."
She opened her mouth to speak, but her mother urgently called out to her to hurry towards the door for the time had come for them to leave. So instead of speaking, she gathered up her supply of courage and wrapped her arms around his waist. She pressed her face into his midsection and hugged him tightly. She pulled away and started running towards the door. She threw him a final glance over her shoulder, a last blinding smile, and left him with three words.
"Don't forget me!"
He knew he never would.