AN:

(Rated T, but this is subject to change. It's Assassin's Creed, so obviously there will be some language and implied sexual content.)

So here's the premise of the story: Three months after finishing Black Flag, I'm still mad about the whole Mary thing. So I decided to fix it for myself. This is how I wish it would have gone down. As of right now, I've planned a six-part story, so expect at least that from me.

Also, this is a songfic. I'll credit the artist at the top of each chapter. The story itself is named for the song by The Kongos, because I can't hear it without envisioning Mary and Edward flying across the deck of the ship, swords blazing. :) (UPDATE 7/22/14: Shortly after publishing this story, I was contacted by one of those renegade hall-monitor groups who have taken it upon themselves to police the fics posted on this site. They took issue with the song lyrics I have included in my songfic. Technically it's against the rules, but since I've previously read about a million and one fics that included lyrics and haven't had a problem since their publication 5+ years ago, I assumed nobody actually bothered much with that rule. It would seem that I was wrong, however, and I'll own that. I don't want a fight, but I do feel this story will be lacking without those lyrics. To fix this, I will be editing the songs out of the version I post here, but post it as it was originally intended on my Tumblr writing blog, GreetTheDawn. You can listen to the song while you read the chapter here (which I strongly recommend, wherever you read it,) or read it in its full glory on my blog. But please leave all reviews on this site! The tag for this story will be 'CWMN Full Chapters'. I hope that resolves the issue!)

One last thing, if you're aching for some good Kiddway the way I have been, I highly recommend Rose Of The Nile's fic, Hollowed Trust. It's 178k words of ship-satisfying goodness with 2 endings: canon and non-canon, depending on your preference. Check it out sometime. Really.

Now, let's begin…

Song: Torn to Pieces - Pop Evil

Four months after his escape from prison, Edward received a letter.

Anne hadn't made it out of Kingston. A guard had shot her down as she was fleeing with Ah Tabai. Kenway hadn't known her terribly well, but he'd certainly known her well enough to miss her. He found himself, more often than he should, drinking far too much at the taverns simply to drown out the deafening silence that had replaced her gentile singing at the Old Avery as she filled tankards and scorned drunken suitors for the fun of it. Few barmaids had ever lived who possessed the cunning wit and grace of Anne Bonny. Few women of any profession, for that matter. Edward knew he would regret for the rest of his life – however long or short that may be – that he never had the chance to see that woman sail. The tales he head from his cell of Anne Bonny and James Kidd claiming the seas as their own wherever they went… Those stories would always stay with him.

Mary, he had been able to get out. Much to Edward's dismay, however, she had been in sorry condition when they had arrived at the Assassin camp in Tulum, barely able to move and hardly conscious. Knowing she likely wouldn't survive more than a few days, and being fully aware that he was unwelcome in the company of the Brotherhood, he had said his final goodbyes the next morning and then left for Great Inagua. He'd have given anything to stay with her, but he knew his presence would do her no good. He hadn't wanted her to leave the world worrying about him.

The moment he had found her laying in her cell, all color and life drained for her face, he knew that he was to blame. If he hadn't been so driven by greed, he might have avoided the Templars and the Assassins would have been safe. He might have avoided Roberts and the Observatory and, subsequently, prison. He could have saved Mary and Anne, himself, the moment they were captured, or perhaps prevented their arrest altogether. At the very least, both of them would be alive. Their black fates were on his hands, were his burden to bear.

Mary's final words to Edward followed him wherever he went, and that was often to the tavern where the absence of Anne's company and Mary's final promise and request drove him to darker places than he might once have believed imaginable.

Do your part, Kenway. I'll be with you. I will.

Edward awoke from a disturbing dream face-down on a Kingston beach to find Adéwalé looming over him, sitting on an empty crate in the sand. "Captain Kenway. You look like a bowl of plum duff."

Edward rolled over onto his back, his hands covering his eyes. The sun seemed too bright. Could the sun do that? Increase in brightness so sharply? It felt like the light was melting his brain. He pulled himself into what might be called a sitting position if you squinted at him hard enough. He swore and grumbled, "I've got a head for ten…" clutching at his skull.

"Why do you do this to yourself, mate?"

With a strangled laugh, he replied, "Because, my old friend, this is the lot I've earned for myself. I've ruined myself to my wife, turned my crew against me, brought death to every man or woman I ever loved through my own selfish ignorance, and now I have nothing. Nothing and no one." Edward did his best to pry his eyes open and look at his quartermaster. "And when a man has nothing left of value, no one left to stand by his side… that man drinks." His clumsy fingers found a mostly-empty bottle by his side and he thrust it forward as though he were making a toast. Before he could bring the rum to his lips, however, Adéwalé snatched the bottle away, and Edward shot him a muddled glare. "You put me on a spot, Adé. After you leaving me with Roberts, I should have hard feelings about seeing you here." More than that, though, he could have saved Mary and Anne if he hadn't been deserted and then thrown in prison alongside them. In a way, their deaths were on the hands of the Jackdaw's crew just as much as his own. However, even in the darkest pit of his mind, he could not blame Adé. He was a good man doing more right by his crew than Edward ever had. The young captain laughed and let his head hang as he attempted to control the rocking of the earth beneath him. "But mostly, I'm bloody glad."

He heard his friend chuckle. "Me too, breddah…" Adéwalé sighed and was quiet a moment before speaking again. "A letter arrived a week or two back in Inagua for you. From Tulum." The quartermaster held out a folded piece of parchment. "I think you had better read it."

Edward ran a hand through his unkempt hair and was rewarded with a fistful of sand. A bath certainly sounded pleasant at that moment, but that required enough sobriety to avoid drowning, and those terms were simply unacceptable to him. "What could those damned Assassins possibly want from me anymore? Destruction and chaos follow me wherever I go, and they know that better than most."

Adéwalé simply placed the letter in Kenway's hand, said, "Read it," and walked away, heading back toward the Jackdaw, which sat proudly in the glistening waters of the port.

Edward slumped back into the sand and stared up gratefully at a palm frond that was blocking the impossibly bright sun from view. A vision of Mary's face burned behind his eyes, first of her happy, standing at the prow of her schooner like she owned the whole world, then of her pale and laying in a cot in Tulum, her eyes dull as they searched his in pleading silence – the last memory had had of her. Both images filled him with guilt, pain, and loss. The visions were an inescapable and debilitating agony, though he did his best to medicate against their effects.

For the longest moment, he laid there and ignored the letter. He didn't want to know what the Assassins had to tell him, because he feared what that might be. He'd kept himself so blissfully ignorant and unthinking, uncomprehending of the information that threatened to overwhelm him if he let his head on straight for any length of time. Mary was dead.

He unfolded the parchment.

There were no words on the page. Simply a set of coordinates and a date, two weeks from the present time.

Edward wasn't precisely sure why – perhaps it was something to do with the 'sense' that Mary had once discussed with him, or maybe it was just the hangover subsiding – but his mind was clearer upon reading those numbers than it had been since Anne and Mary had died.

There wasn't a decision to go. He didn't have to make one. He simply knew that he was going.

It wasn't until several days later, when all preparations had been made and he stood at the helm of the Jackdaw once more, that Edward realized why the letter had spurred him the way it did. He didn't know what he would find at the other end of the short journey, or why he had been summoned, and experience told him it would not be enjoyable. But it had given him a purpose in a time when his life was entirely devoid of any reason or drive to continue. And it felt good.

AN:

This chapter was mainly to get momentum up for the actual story. The meat of it will be in the next chapter, which I promise to publish next Monday (July 28, 2014)!