Some say having a woman aboard a ship is bad luck. Some say that women are evil and have even gone so far as to accuse some of witchcraft. Some were burned at the stake for such crimes. None of these things were anything that Isabelle Beckett held any stock in.

No one would believe that the statuesque young woman on the deck of the rolling sloop, dressed as she was in the finest of Indian silks and holding her head high, was once a huddled, dirty urchin held in the bowels of Bedlam Asylum. She of all people knew that things weren't always what they seemed.

Isabelle remembered distinctly the day Lord Beckett first came into her private cell at Bedlam Asylum. She'd been put in the dank, isolated cell because she was a danger to herself and to others. She'd lashed out at guards and other prisoners, they'd tried chaining her, but her keening had kept others up and her jailors finally did as she had begged, and brought her to a solitary cell.

Isabelle looked up through a curtain of greasy hair as two men walked into her cell. The first one smiled kindly at her. He was a regular to her sad little isolated world, and often brought her sweets and a bit of extra bread. The jailor was large and had dark greasy hair that fell in his face; he thought it hid the pox scars, but it brought more attention to them. The second man was obviously not a member of Bedlam's illustrious poor. His gray overcoat was of the finest quality wool and the India silk of his waistcoat shone in the dank cell. Isabelle had never seen colors so vibrant before. His wig was perfectly powdered and curled. He held a kerchief to his nose to try and block out the stench of bodies and filth that permeated every pore of the building.

"No." Isabelle said. She tried to press herself farther back into the cold brick walls and stared resolutely at the shadows opposite her.

"No what?" The well dressed man asked looking to his guide.

"I won't do it." Isabelle answered. "I won't."

"I'm afraid you just did dearest…I never did ask me question." The greasy man said with a black toothed grin. Isabelle scowled in the pale torch light.

"You said that you had something of interest to show me, and you show me a dirty child…why?" The well dressed man asked impatiently.

"Because she can read people, sir. Watch…"

"I don't want to." The little girl whispered into the darkness.

"Come now dearest….this is your chance…." The jailor's voice oozed and flowed sweet as liquid sugar as he tried to convince the child. The well dressed man watched, disgusted as the little girl crawled forward and grasped the hem of her jailor's frayed coat.

"Please…just leave me here…forget about me…" The jailor raised his arm as if to strike her and she flew back to her corner of the cell as if the man had wielded fire against her.

"That's better." The man said lowering his arm and returning to his sugar sweet demeanor. The girl stood up slowly and seemed to wobble on her stick thin legs. The well dressed man was revolted as the skeleton girl shuffled in front of the big man as he led his other guest down the hall into a room he'd set up earlier. "Now, sir, go on that side of the board and set out the cards in any order you wish." The well dressed man did as he was asked, curious to see what game the jailor was up to. The little girl stood beside the door and watched as Beckett moved the cards about behind the board on the table.

"Now, look at the cards and think about them, sir. She'll tell you what cards you picked." Without waiting Isabelle began to spout off the names and suits of the cards Lord Beckett had lain out on the table.

"Three of clubs, six of spades, King of clubs, Jack of clubs, Queen of Hearts…..He's thinking of the ace of spades, but he's trying to fool me…it's the two of hearts."

Lord Beckett's eyes focused on the child.

"How do you know that?" He asked.

"I don't know." The girl looked away. "You don't believe it though."

"No."

"There are men playing dice in the next room….one is about to accuse the other of cheating." Suddenly an outburst broke through the door and the sound of raised voices bounced off the walls of the hall. The jailor ignored it as the voices carried away from the room they were in.

"She's what the gypsy's call an empath sir…a reader. She knows what you're thinking before you do."

"How did you find out?"

"Chance…she warned me that one of the committed unfortunates had it out for me. Bugger nearly killed me when me back was turned."

"Can she do it again?"

"She can't NOT do it again." The jailor answered with a derisive laugh as he looked at the girl affectionately and stroked her greasy hair. She jerked away and glared at them both. The well dressed gentleman approached the child and knelt down to look up into her dark, haunting eyes.

"If I take you from here….will you do it again?"

"I don't want to."

"Well now, aren't you a good English Girl?" The child stared blankly and flinched, before answering.

"Yes."

"Well now, all good English Girls wish to help their King and Crown. Did you know that?" The little girl glared at the man. "Of course you did. And if you came with me, you'd be helping the King."

"I'd be helping the King, but you'd profit from it."

"As shall the King." The little girl narrowed her eyes on the man. "Would you rather rot in this place forever!" The man suddenly bellowed and the girl flung herself backwards as if burned and cowered in the corner.

She whimpered in the corner for a moment before pushing the hair from her face and looking up at Beckett, neither agreeing, nor protesting.

"Pack her up…I'll take her." Lord Beckett left the room in a hurry leaving the jailor to make the necessary arrangements to move Isabelle.

Isabelle stood in the townhouse and looked up at the fine white porcelain walls, the fine sweep of the marble staircase and the elegant crystal chandelier above them. A plump woman swept down the stairs and curtsied before the well dressed gentleman and Isabelle.

"Feed her, dress her…for God's sake, bathe her." The man said as he stalked away from them, his polished shoes echoing on the hardwood floors. "Have her prepared to leave this evening." He shouted as he exited the foyer.

The woman took the girl upstairs and did as the lord had asked. The woman was brushing Isabelle's newly cleaned hair when suddenly Isabelle turned around and stared at the door to the sparse room.

"What is it girl?"

"There's a boy out there….looking through the key hole…." The sudden 'thunk' of a heavy marble hitting the floor betrayed their watcher and the maid opened the door to show a blue eyed, brown haired boy staring back.

"Cutler! How many times have I told you not to go peeping in key holes?"

"You don't get to tell me what to do. I'll be lord of this house when my father dies." The boy stalked down the hallway with his nose in the air.

"Who is he?" Isabelle asked still sitting in the chair where the maid had left her.

"How did you know he was there? I didn't hear a peep from him until his marble fell."

"I heard a board creak." Isabelle lied as she turned back to look in the mirror. She didn't like telling people that she knew what they were thinking. She didn't want the woman to know she was reading her thoughts.

"Aren't you a lucky one…you'll be going to India with his Lordship on the evening tide."

"India?"

"Aye." The woman said as she plaited Isabelle's hair and tied it off with a thick green ribbon that matched her dress. "You'll have a grand time down there I expect."

Isabelle was pulled from her reverie as the planks of the ship's decking shuddered imperceptibly. The sailors on deck continued to scurry about furling sails and scrubbing decking. Cutler was below decks in the big cabin going over ledgers and maps.

He was angry.

She felt as if flames were licking at her slippered feet. She rolled her eyes and continued to stare at the rolling blue gray waves of the open sea.

She'd known Cutler since she was five. That was when his father, Lord Andrew Beckett, had brought her to work for him. The night she'd been taken from Bedlam, and brought to the townhouse, she, Cutler, and the plump woman, rode in a carriage to the docks where a ship bobbed in the high tide.

"Well, she does clean up rather well." Lord Beckett said when he saw Isabelle come up the gangway holding the hand of the plump woman. "That will be all Ann. Good night." The plump woman curtsied, and left Isabelle with Lord Beckett and his eight year old son.

The crossing from England was difficult on her. She'd never been on a ship before, much less seen one. The first few days of the voyage she spent retching, the next few days she was weakened and ill. Young Cutler came in and taunted her at first and then sobered when he realized how ill suited to sea life she was.

"Why don't you come out of bed and up on deck? Fresh air will do you good." He said one day when she awoke.

Isabelle shook her head. She could hear over a hundred different thoughts bounding through her head and as many feelings battered at her soul. She had a splitting head ache and between the roll of the sea and noise between her ears, she was not in any condition to be on her feet. This was worse than Bedlam to her. She'd at least been able to beg her way into a solitary cell….on a ship there was no escape.

She was given mild teas at first and eventually everyone left her alone. One day she awoke to see a dark skinned man sitting in her cabin.

"How do you feel child?"

"Tired."

"Tired?" The man's brow furrowed beneath his turban. "You have done nothing for which to be tired."

"You wouldn't understand." Isabelle said rubbing her eyes.

"Wouldn't I?" Isabelle looked up at the man. His lips hadn't moved, yet she distinctly heard his voice in her head. It had been channeled into her mind, it wasn't a stray thought that she had just picked up at random.

"How did you do that?"

"Because, I do understand you. I understand all to well." The man smiled and leaned towards her. "If I teach you to control your gift, will you promise to get up, and help Lord Beckett?"

Isabelle was silent for a moment, weighing her options. It seemed to her she had little option in the prospect of helping Lord Beckett…if she got an occasional meal and a dress out of it, it would have been fine, but with her getting the ability to control her gift….then she was coming out far ahead of the game.

"Yes."

"Don't say it….think it….transport it to my mind."

Isabelle stared at the man long and hard and concentrated on the word 'yes' as if every fiber of her being depended on it.

"Not so hard, I'm right here….no need to shout!" The man said holding up his hands. "Come…get some air."

The next few weeks the man helped Isabelle focus. He taught her to see beyond things as things, but to see every minute detail.

"Kapil, the waters have changed color…they're bluer!" She said one day, standing on tiptoe to see up over the rail. "They aren't so gray anymore."

"You're right…we near our end destination." He said coming to stand beside her. He smiled down at her and waited to see the dark line of land that was his home.

Kapil was her mentor for the next ten years of her life. He taught her many things, not only about her gift, but about how to use it, to control it, and how to shutter it. India was more her home than England had ever been. She loved every minute of her time in the tropic country. Cutler eventually warmed to her, and the two became like brother and sister.

At first she didn't quite understand what she was doing for Lord Beckett, but any confusion she may have had was instantly washed away when she realized how much Lord Beckett provided her.

A tear came to her eye as she remembered Kapil and the former Lord Beckett. She looked towards the stern of the ship where she knew Cutler was sitting. He was angry; she felt the ship shudder with his wrath, but at the moment she was just as angry with him. He had changed, and she didn't like it at all. She turned her attention back to the sea beyond and thought back to warm and fragrant India.

She remembered the first time she had actually done any real work for Lord Beckett. She had been nine and over eager for a real assignment from him. The measly spying she'd done for Beckett at small buyers meetings was all well and good, but Kapil had always been present. Beckett, who'd grown fond of her and thought of her as his own daughter, was reluctant, but slowly agreed. He'd had her sit in a large wing backed chair facing the hearth away from the business table. She was invisible from that position. At first she felt nothing, the men talked about things she didn't understand. Then things began to get heated as business matters began to escalate. As voices rose she was repeatedly engulfed in a swirling mass of flame and near unbearable heat. She held her breath and shut her eyes against the swirling mass of heat and fire, trying as Kapil had taught her to shutter out the anger. An hour later the men left and she was left weakened by the experience. Lord Beckett knelt before the big chair and stared into her pale face and wide eyes.

"Isabelle?"

"They're all honest men. They want the fair prices for their goods….." Her voice was barely a whisper and it was as if she was too weak to even move her jaw or her eyes. She finally pulled her eyes from the gently floating curtain and focused on Lord Beckett. "None of them are cheating you."

"Are you alright?"

"I feel tired." Lord Beckett swept the girl up and carried her to her room where she slept for the rest of the day. When she woke up, Cutler was sitting on the edge of her bed staring at her.

"Father said you might want something to eat."

"No, thank you." Isabelle said as she slowly sat up. "I don't feel much like eating right now."

"What happened?"

"Has your father never told you what it is I can do?"

"What you can do? You're only a slip of a girl….what can you possibly do?"

"Nothing…never mind…." The tension between Cutler and Isabelle could have been cut with a knife that night. Fortunately a maid came in and forced Cutler out and made Isabelle go back to bed.

There was still a lot for Isabelle to learn, and she took her chance to go to Kapil's house in the village and learn from him what she could. One day, on returning from Kapil's she found several trunks stacked in the foyer.

"What's going on?" Isabelle asked the first footman she saw.

"We're getting Master Cutler ready for school. He's to go to England for his education."

Cutler left India bound for gloomy old England. He was cold towards her when he left; something she'd felt for some time from him. Lord Beckett did not let her linger on being lonely though, and kept her hard at work. For the next six years Cutler was absent from India. She had just turned sixteen when he returned home. No expense was spared on the lavish party to welcome Lord Beckett's only son home from school. In six years, Isabelle had gone from an ungainly, scared child, to a blossoming beauty. She was smart, and knew when to keep things to herself. Lord Beckett was very proud of her and Cutler knew it.

"Mister Bellowes is skimming from you." Isabelle told Lord Beckett. "He takes just enough to be considered 'damaged' on the books and you and the Company are none the wiser."

Lord Beckett looked at her and smiled slowly.

"You've come a very long way Isabelle."

"Sir?"

"When I found you, you were a scared little girl in a gloomy dirty cell."

"I remember sir." She didn't particularly care to dwell on her dark past.

"And now look at you! Attending meetings for one of the largest trade organizations in the world, telling me who is cheating me. You're a beautiful young woman who is in control of every aspect of her being."

"Not a day goes by that I don't try to thank you, my Lord." Isaeblle said inclining her head. "This is but a small way I can repay you."

"Thank you Isabelle…you may go." Isabelle exited the library and saw Cutler standing at the bottom of the stairs. He seemed too pale…white linen shirt, white linen waistcoat, white breeches, white powdered wig. Compared to the sun kissed honey of Isabelle's complexion Cutler seemed to be a ghost.

Isabelle was sitting in Kapil's yard surrounded by his children. She laughed and played with the youngest, only two years old. The little girl had a head of dark silky hair and dark skin. Her teeth were little pearls in a happy mouth.

"She's beautiful Kapil. You and Muniya must be so proud."

"I am equally proud of all my children, but yes, Kiri is a beauty." He said leaning forward to take the little girl from Isabelle's arms. He smiled down into the warm doe eyes that reflected his own.

"Kapil…." The man looked away from his daughter and Isabelle looked away.

"What is it Isabelle? You are distracted today."

"Nothing."

"You have grown strong in your gift, Isabelle, but you can't hide everything." Isabelle forced Kapil from her mind and glared at him.

"You have no right to do that."

"Then tell me what is bothering you." Kapil reached across the small tea table and grasped her hand.

"Cutler." Isabelle looked around as if she were afraid someone was listening in.

"What of him?"

"He frightens me. He's so cold after being in London."

"You remember London…it is cold there."

"No. He's cold. He stares at me so….I feel as if I'm in ice whenever he's near me."

"You must be strong…you must block him out."

"I don't think I can."

"You have to." Kapil said staring intently at her. "You have to block him out if you are to be able to exist in this world."

Another shuddering burst of anger from beneath the decks pulled Isabelle from her reverie for the third time. Rolling her eyes she moved across the deck and went down to Cutler's brightly lit cabin at the stern of the ship.

"That's not good enough!" Cutler railed at someone, his voice carrying through the thin wood of the door. "I don't care if you have to hang out every stitch of fabric on this ship to make us go faster, just get us into Port Royal!"

"Aye sir." Isabelle slipped in as the man slipped out. Cutler looked up from his desk as Isabelle stood at the door.

"Where have you been? I could have used you."

"I was up on deck taking the air. It's rather crowded below decks."

"Crowded in your mind, you mean." He said grinning.

"No. I'm better than I used to be when I was younger." She watched as he rose from his ornate desk and strolled towards her.

"You were better when you were younger." He said grinning down at her. "Full of such fear….full of a desire to please…" He had closed the distance between them in the small cabin and he stood so close to Isabelle that she could feel his breath on her face.

"Cutler, stand back." He lashed out with such ferocity that she was knocked back both physically and mentally. He reached out and grasped her throat in his hand and hissed at her through clenched teeth.

"You will refer to me by my title and you will NOT tell me what to do!"

"Someone is coming…" Isabelle whispered, her eyes cold and distant. A soft knock on the door drew their attention and Cutler pushed her against the wall and went behind his desk before calling the intruder in.

"What is it!?" A young midshipman entered the cabin and stared at the irate Lord behind the huge desk.

"My Lord Beckett, we are nearing Port Royal, we have sighted land."

"Well, finally!" Cutler's anger abated and Isabelle sighed in relief. "How long before we are able to dock?"

"The Captain believes we shall put to port before tomorrow noon time."

"Very well, if that is the soonest we can put to port."

"Aye sir." Cutler dismissed the man with a wave of his hand and left just Isabelle standing in the cabin. Isabelle grasped the edge of her shawl and pulled it over her shoulders. Instinctively she knew that a storm was brewing, both within and without the cabin.

"Isabelle…." Cutler brought his steel blue eyes to meet her dark brown ones. "It is not my intention to be angry with you…."

"I know."

"I am just under a great deal of stress…you understand." Cutler flashed a lopsided grin, but Isabelle felt no warmth. She continued to stare at him stonily.

"Of course, Lord Beckett." She dipped a curtsy and turned to leave.

"You were not dismissed." The glacial tone in his voice brought Isabelle to a halt with her hand hovering over the door handle. Cutler came back to stand behind her and placed a hand gently upon her shoulder. "Why do you fear me so?"

"I don't fear you." His hand clasped down upon her shoulder harshly and she ground her teeth against the pressure of it.

"Lying is futile Isabelle. You know it is…" Isabelle chose to remain silent as she felt Cutler's breath ghost across her neck. "Tell me…what am I thinking now?"

"Please…don't do this…" Isabelle turned quickly and looked up into Lord Beckett's icy eyes. "Please excuse me. I have to go prepare to put in to port." Cutler backed away and glared at her through narrow eyes.

"Yes. Go." He dismissed her with the same wave of his hand as he had the midshipman and she made a quick exit to her own small cabin.