~|Pirates of the Caribbean: Beneath the Jolly Roger|~
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The wind seemed suppressed and heavy in the thick fog that hung over the Caribbean ocean. What should have been shimmering blue water to rival the gleam of sapphires she had been told, was dull and grey-black. Softly to herself she hummed a little tune she had heard some sailors singing to at the docks back on the Thames in England. As she began to mumble the words under her breath, a hand came to her shoulder.
Elizabeth or Lizzie as her father called her – her mother too, before the fair and beautiful lady had died of consumption – whirled. The young lieutenant stood behind her, his dark grey eyes revealing that he was seemingly troubled by the words of a twelve year old girl.
"You should not sing of pirates, Miss Swann, they are vile and dissolute creatures all of them; not to be trusted," he declared in a low voice earnestly.
"I don't know, I think I should like to meet one someday," she retorted brightly; the lieutenant - Jim Norrington - was only seventeen, and she enjoyed it when her outspokenness made him bluster or act shocked. It had become her secret task to frustrate him during the crossing from England to the colonial island port her father was to become governor of - Port Royal - in the exotic Caribbean Sea.
"I disagree. It has been made a point by the captain of this vessel that every one of his seamen be present when a pirate is captured by this ship and then dispatched. I am under the belief that each and every one of those men who take up the pirate flag get what they deserve: a short drop and a sudden stop." A steel-hard look entered his eyes, and he turned his head to gaze down at the water.
Lizzie frowned; what did he mean? As if to aid her in an answer, a midshipman who was twisting hemp quietly beside the rail crossed his eyes and pulled hard at the torn and dirty red cravat tied round his neck as if he were being hung. Suddenly she understood, and smiled a bit at Jim's properness. She had seen scores of hangings in London, and she didn't fancy a single one; Jim needn't talk so prettily to her, she knew.
"Well I believe that is a cruel and cowardly thing to do! Are all men to be judged because they are brave enough not to conform to society and its rules? Must all be under the suppressive fist of unequal laws; I –"
"Elizabeth, that is quite enough; no need to shock Lt. Norrington, I'm certain." Her father's stern voice came out of the fog, and a few minutes later, both she and Jim could see him climb up the steps to the foredeck. "I'm afraid her mother was rather an outspoken woman, and took young Lizzie to one too many hangings. Lady Swann had been a lawyer's daughter." Governor Swann smiled at Norrington as if apologetic about his daughter.
"Miss Swann must carry after her mother greatly, sir, for she seems to be of strong opinion that we do not deal correctly with these rogues who try to evade the laws any good, Christian man should abide by," Norrington allowed, nodding slightly.
"Well, perhaps -"
"Mary, mother of God!" the cry rang from behind them, and as they looked at the midshipman, he pointed past them in shock, rousing the crew, who quickly took up a chilling cry of "fire!"
The burning ship rose up like some bewitched vessel from out of the fog. Debris floated by in the water, and what looked to Lizzie as... bodies. She shrank back when her father put his hands on her shoulders, and cowered against him. How awful, to die in such a way. She turned her head from it, long curls at the back of her neck striking her cheek at the abrupt action.
"It must have been a merchant; her magazine must have caught; such vessels run heavily armed in these waters. I will go alert Captain Toliver." Lt. Norrington seemed to be talking to calm not only himself, but the sailors rushing around him, moving to ready the longboats and search the wreckage for anyone still alive... if that were even possible in such a blaze as what burned on the water before them.
Lizzie moved so her cheek rubbed against her father's waistcoat, morbid fascination getting the better of her as it did with all people. That was when she saw it: a ship gliding silently away through the fog. Her eyes lifted to its tall mast, searching for the billowing object that would betray what sort of vessel it was. At first, she thought it would slink away without an identity, but suddenly the silent wind rippled the dark flag, and for an instant she saw the white emblems sewn across it. Pirates.
"Master Gibbs, keep silent!" Norrington's voice rang authoritively. Lizzie and her father turned sharply to see what was going on behind them, down amidships, near the boats.
"Well everyone's thinkin' it, it can't help but be said!" the man retorted strongly. "We all know its cursed pirates roam these waters, could'a been such men what did a crime as this."
Lizzie shivered, wondering if she should speak up about what she had seen. But, just as she was about to, she noticed one of the cabin boys who had become stock-still at Midshipman Gibbs's words, the boy's eyes round as pie-plates. She clamped her lips shut. Besides, she wasn't about to tattle on the selfsame people she had been defending moments ago.
"Master Gibbs, no need to frighten our passengers! It was a merchant, it was a bad sea, and she was probably in a bad way; you know well how much powder these merchant ships carry, especially so near Port Royal." The tall, grey-haired figure of Captain Toliver came sternly down the deck; the old seaman carried himself with dignity and authority. His calm manner quickly eased many of the unnerved sailors scurrying about.
"Aye, Cap'n," the midshipman replied with more than a hint of skepticism. He bobbed his head and moved to begin lowering a boat. Lizzie was as skeptical as the man; she knew that he was right, though she said nothing.
"Forgive me, Governor, I did not want your arrival to be so shadowed with such a tragedy as this." Captain Toliver mounted the stairs to speak to Weatherby Swann. He tilted his head down to smile slightly at Lizzie. "Miss Swann, I pray this has not made you fearing of the sea," he apologized.
"It didn't, I just hope that your sailors will aspire to save all who can be rescued," she replied quickly, feeling a bit shy for some reason.
"Ah, yes, Lizzie, I'm certain Captain Toliver's men will do their level best; now, Jeremiah, what did you mean about merchant ships hereabouts carrying large quantities of powder so close to Port Royal?" Weatherby looked slightly concerned in a way that made Lizzie think he resembled the large dog their old houseman, Master Bradley, had owned. The dog always had that slightly worried, bothered expression on his brown furry face.
"Oh, I simply imply that as it is a very active port, and military practices are held in daily routine, there is a constant need for the fort there to be well-supplied with powder and shot. Merchants sailing in these waters often carry such cargo. Which make for unfortunate circumstances such as this one," the captain waved out towards the burning frame of the ship on the water, to which several sailors in longboats were row rowing up to.
"Ah, indeed. What an unfortunate thing to happen," Weatherby replied, turning to look out at the burning ship.
It seemed an hour, but it was thirty minutes at the most, when a longboat could be seen rowing rapidly back to the ship. Lt. Norrington had been aboard it, and he was signaling in military fashion to those aboard the Baybright– the ship Lizzie and her father were on.
"Quickly, get blankets and lay them on the deck– also some canvas, for I fear from Lt. Norrington's signals that this passenger shall not be long in sailing with us," Captain Toliver ordered abruptly, motioning to some of the seamen and rapidly walking to the rail.
As the men worked quickly to bring the injured person aboard, Lizzie watched curiously. Suddenly Lt. Norrington was standing before her and her father. "The lady... young woman... wishes for a female to comfort her; she does not have long, Governor. She was crossing over from England or Ireland, so far as we might discern. She is whole, merely half-drowned. Would you allow...?" he trailed off awkwardly, looking away from Weatherby Swann.
"Of course, I would wish the same were my Lizzie – God forbid – in her place. Go, Lizzie, see what you can do to ease the poor creature's passing; Lt. Norrington says she is not disfigured in any way, so you have no reason to be fearful," the Governor said, gently pushed Lizzie forward, away from his side with a compassionate, sad smile. She bobbed a curtsy and hurriedly followed Norrington, all thoughts of provoking him forgotten.
She stopped, shocked, when she came to the girl lying upon the blankets on deck. Her long brown hair streamed out damply around her, and her breath was shallow. Her lashes were long and dark against her pale skin. Suddenly spurred into action, Lizzie dropped down at the girl's side. The sailors and Norrington went about on deck, busy with lowering the boat again and looking for any other injured or barely-living survivors among the wreck. Lizzie reached out, lightly touching her fingers against the girl's hand.
She started, jerking when the girl opened her eyes, gasping hoarsely. Her hand grasped Lizzie's, and her eyes searched round wildly before thy fell upon the younger girl's face. "I am... Josephine... Turner from... London." She jerked violently, and Lizzie realized she was cold; her skin was like ice, and Josephine's fingers clinging to her wrist stung Lizzie's skin they were so chilled.
"I'm Elizabeth Swann, the female company you asked for," Lizzie returned softly, letting the young woman clasp her wrist, wrapping her own fingers around the other girl's, warming it slightly.
"Are there any... men... about?" The girl looked up intently at Lizzie with surprisingly peaceful brown eyes.
"No, we are being given some manner of privacy," she answered back.
"Good... Quickly, take the chain round... my... neck..." The young woman struggled to raise her hand to her throat, but was too weak to grasp whatever she wanted. Lizzie hurriedly did as asked, fumbling with the tricky gold clasp of the fine chain for a moment before carefully pulling it out from under the girl's wet clothes and bodice.
"Keep it!" Josephine Turner seemed to find some last reserve of strength, for she sat up on deck slightly, and forcefully closed Lizzie's fingers around the medallion cradled in her palm without giving her time to study it. "Do not let... the men see... it! I pray, fulfill a dying girl's request!" Her brown eyes, that must have once been filled with life, dimmed, and her pale face seemed to be pleading with the last of her energy.
"I swear... by, by everything!" the twelve year old girl answered earnestly.
"They shall come for it... when the winds change. They need it, for... him to live. He must obtain it..." The girl seemed delirious, and as she lay back down, muttered mindlessly. "When the... winds... change," she murmured as her eyelids fluttered closed. "Keep a weather eye!" she cried suddenly, her eyes opening wide as she struggled to inhale a ragged breath. "Always..." and then she lay still. It took a moment for Lizzie to realize she was dead. She pulled back, startled, her skirts and petticoats rustling.
Her gaze left the girl's body and travelled to her fisted hand. Slowly, she opened it. Grinning gold skull and crossbones with a frill around it of strange symbols also made of gold looked back at her. Was it some sort of pirate symbol? She looked back at the corpse warily. "She was... a pirate..." she murmured under her breath in shock. She had no more time to ponder the shocking thought, however, when a hand rested on her shoulder.
"Is she… gone?" Her father seemed hesitant to ask the question, and Lizzie quickly concealed the medallion and chain in her dress pocket as he leaned over her shoulder slightly to see the girl lying upon the deck.
"Yes… She did tell me that her name was Josephine Turner and that she was from London, before her…" Lizzie was suddenly quiet, realization sinking into her twelve year old mind.
"Come away then, Lizzie; there's no more you can do for the poor girl now. At least she's at peace. Come; let's get back to our cabin, out of the sailors' way." Weatherby Swann guided his daughter before him, a comforting, steadying hand on her shoulder. Lizzie threw a parting glance over her shoulder at the dead girl. She looked so pale and small on the deck, the pallor that the dead inherit after they breathe their last slowly seeping into her skin. She looked strange in death, and Lizzie's fingers against the weighty object in her pocket made her wonder who Josephine Turner had been in life.
~|One Hour Later|~
A large frigate loomed out of the fog, drifting slowly through the tide, as if searching for something. A large figurehead of an angel holding a skeleton, wings arching up to become part of the bow, looked ominous as it cleaved through the clouded sea. "We're too late!" A man in a dark billowy shirt declared in anguish, his frayed green sash hitting his trousers tucked into boots as he moved quickly down the stairs from the helm to the rail. Not far behind him, a brown-haired lad followed suit, staring out across the water at a burning wreck that was coming into view.
The boy peered with anxious eyes at the debris as it drifted by the frigate's sides, sometimes scrapping eerily. Bodies could occasionally be seen as well, and he shuddered. "But, father, Josie cannot be dead!" he cried adamantly, not wishing to believe it.
"We have come too late, Will, she… she's gone…" The man bowed his head; dark hair streaked with grey hid his tears and his face from his son's view.
"No! No, Jo cannot be dead! I refuse to believe it! Jo- Jo, answer me! You are not dead, you cannot be!" the boy screamed nearly close to hysterics, leaning out over the railing and searching the water. His sister had been the closest thing to a mother that the fourteen year old had had, and she could not be gone.
"Will, William, it is no good, son," Will's father whispered in a soothing tone of voice, wrapping his arms about his son, pulling him close. "She's dead." Father and son wept tears together.
"H-how could this have happened? She was crossing over from England to be with us; she was tired of being away, why?" Will whispered, looking out at the fog and the water with a dazed stare.
"She, that was not truly why we were to meet, William," his father began hesitantly. But the boy pulled away from him, turning to stare into the man's face with horror.
"No, not because of me. She did not die because you made her… bring my curse with her!" He looked aghast as he spat the words out in a shocked whisper.
"What else could we have done, William? She was willing to go the run, and I let her! I could not have asked less of Jo, and you know it as well as I," his father, Bill, hurriedly replied, straightening and looking at his son with pain in his brown eyes to equal his son's.
"I would rather be bound to Jones instead of living with the guilt that my sister is dead because of me!" he cried in reply, whirling and running off down the deck, his figure swallowed up by the heavy fog surrounding the frigate. The boy's father covered his face with his hands, shoulder hunched with stress and grief.
"Someday, he will understand what you an' Josie done for him," a voice echoed out of the fog, coming from Bill Turner's blonde first mate, Donnell. The man reached out and placed a scarred and weathered hand on his captain's shoulder, the beads in his long hair clinking as he moved.
"He has no idea that what he said struck close to the truth; what will he do when I tell him?" Bill murmured brokenly, staring at the worn deck beneath his boots. "Six years is all that's left, Donnell, six years to find that medallion and the charts. To break the curse his mother's father struck with Jones that will bind him forever to that monster if we cannot undo it! Will he understand when I tell him?" Bill turned to look at his first mate, eyes filled with hopelessness.
"He shall, I can bet. Remember, you're doing this for him, and the mother he was not allowed to have. Jo knew this just as much as I, which was the reason she was bein' so willing about bringin' the medallion to us," Donnell pointed out sensibly.
"But what if Barbossa and his cursed crew took it from her? Then there will be no hope left, for the Muerte will sink once they find the last piece of gold," Bill returned, his brow furrowing with concentration as he worried over this new possible turn of events.
"If that 'tis so, don't you think Will wouldn't be actin' so healthy? Wouldn't this weather have faded off also? Jo was smart, she done somethin' sly, be sure, Captain," Donnell answered, nodding in respect to the dead girl. Bill smiled sadly at his first mate's words. Donnell was right, as usual.
"Then we go to the south, what say you?" Bill asked, straightening and moving forward slightly.
"Aye, to the south. Will is not goin' t be bound to Jones without a fight from our side," Donnell replied.
Bill nodded, striding off down the deck, giving out orders to his crew. Sailors scurried to fulfill his commands, springing up the ratlines and pulling on various pieces of rigging to get the Death Angel into the wind again. High atop the mast, a great dark flag of canvas billowed, the leering pirate emblem set in stark relief against it.
A/N:
This is just something random I thought of when I was watching CotBP a few days back now. I got as far as the part in the prologue where Lt. Norrington talks of hanging pirates, and suddenly wondered: "What if Will had been a pirate from the beginning? What if his father had not been dead/ under a curse from Davy Jones?" Which gave birth to this idea.
I have no idea what anyone will think, and if no one reviews, then I'll certainly know what people think and take this story down. Please review and tell me your opinion, as reviews are what keep me writing,
WH