Disclaimer: I don't own anything I'm writing about, if I did, this would be a film and I'd be rich. I'm just doing it for the love of the fandom.

Notes: This story germinated from a dream that was so vivid I just had to write a story. I've fleshed it out and started setting it down. Be prepared for a long journey, this fic will be posted in chapters, but I can't tell you how many. I'm aiming for one a week. I'm also looking for a beta to read this and offer any tips.

All the old favourites will make an appearance, Jack, (obv!), Will and Elizabeth as well as a new baddy, (boo, hiss!), and a new fantastical treasure. I love reading nautical stories and I'm hoping that this is going to be a nautically and historically correct story. Every bit is researched to the best of my ability. If you need to know anything I've usually found all my info on Google, so that's a good place to start. I promise it will have a title soon too! Please, please review if you read. I like encouragement, it's me rum!

Prologue

It was a bleak dawn that day, the sea as calm and still as a millpond, such as he had not seen for many months. The sky was empty; save for a lone gull flying out in the west, clear of cloud and of respite from the harsh sun that had started her unassailable ascent an hour earlier. The night watch were still at their posts, strange to see as they appeared to be standing asleep, lax in their watch – a flogging offence – and one he had never enforced. What had stirred him this early? His first mate was in charge for another hour at least according to his mental rote, but nevertheless he could not return to his cabin. There was an ill wind blowing and a creeping sensation in his gut told him from which compass point it originated. His brow pinched in concentration. It was too late for the rum of last night to have any lasting effect and too early for him to have consumed the amount needed to explain this creeping unease away. He'd set great stock by his intuition since he'd been betrayed and marooned, vowing never to trust blindly or be fooled willingly, but did that include being mislead by his own thoughts and cursed emotions?

Belay that.

For the first time in nigh on ten years it wasn't just himself he was misleading, not just himself going off on a whim, taken by a fancy that no one could explain. No, now he had a crew to command. A crew that would look to their captain for guidance, whose lives and freedom depended on him: a crew that would trust him, no matter what, to lead them through whatever trouble they may encounter. Squinting at the horizon Jack tilted his head, as if trying to listen to a whispering voice tickling his ear. What if they realised the truth? What if, after the order had been given, Gibbs started to look at his motives a little too closely? Jack winced at the phantom pain the thought brought with it, his fingers tightening on the rail. Could he honestly lead the Black Pearl's crew back into certain lethal danger without warning? His brain ached. The gnawing sensation in his gut growing stronger as he fought a war with himself, his head twitching from side to side.

"Cap'n?" Gibbs' voice cut in from somewhere to his left, but Jack refused to look directly at him, fearing that his indecision would show in his eyes. "Cap'n, have ye got any orders?" That, Jack knew, was the pertinent question. Had he? He knew what his heart was screaming at him to do, what course to plot, but how would Gibbs react? How much longer could he captain his crew by wrapping his intentions in riddles, before one of them decided that enough was enough? Ever since the Isle de Muerte, the Black Pearl's crew had steadily increased in size until he was only a couple of hands short of a full compliment. If they wanted him gone, there wasn't much he could do about it. Indeed, if they really did mutiny, the first Jack would know about it would be when he either landed in the deep blue, or felt the kiss of a steel blade. But since when had Captain Jack Sparrow let such little trifles worry him?

"Orders? Orders. Yes, I have. We are plotting a course due east; sailing until I tell you otherwise." He risked a glance at Gibbs, who had taken a step back at the words, narrowing his eyes as if trying to foresee their destination.

"Due east you say, Cap'n?" Jack gave a concise nod, his beads jangling loudly in the brightening morning. "Due east it be then. Change of course, lads!" As Gibbs walked away he risked one last glance back at his capricious captain, noting with trepidation how stiff Jack was holding himself and how white his knuckles were as they gripped the wood of the Pearl as if his life depended on it.

Jack rubbed his head in agitation, his mind in turmoil. Perhaps the slide towards mutiny would start that morning, for he could give no satisfactory explanation as to why he was ordering the ship to be brought about, away from the rich merchant ships ripe for looting, and back towards a port that had prices on all their heads. No, there was no satisfactory, logical reason for altering course, but there was an intuitive, emotional one.

There was trouble in Port Royal.

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