The King of Pirates
~ Chapter Three ~
Disclaimer: Storyline is mine, all the characters you recognise belong to JK Rowling.
The Marauders are the best spies in England. It's up to them to find and catch the self-proclaimed King of Pirates; the man looking to overthrow the crown and take it for himself.
Lily stared across the room at her grandmother, a look of revulsion on her face. She stood in the centre of the room while her grandmother sat at her fathers favourite desk. She didn't think she'd ever felt so angry before.
When she had gotten home earlier, she knew the moment she had seen her grandmother waiting for her at the door there would be a number of things they would need to work out, but she hadn't realised the extent to which her grandmother had gone to get what she wanted.
"Grandmother, I don't care what you say, I will not marry Lord Malfoy."
She had tried speaking calmly, rationally but nothing she said seemed to get through to her grandmother. She countered every argument Lily could come up with; she was getting old, she needed to start a family, her parents should have done their job and had her married off years ago, if she didn't step in nothing would happen, she would become spinster.
Her grandmother hadn't been too pleased with Lily's response to that particular reason.
Her grandmother opened her mouth to continue but Lily jumped in before she had a chance.
"Nothing you do or say will convince me to marry this man. He's horrible, rude, and arrogant. I could never love him."
Lily's voice cracked on the last word and she stopped, breathing hard. She was never good with arguments. She always got too emotional, and she knew that crying now would do nothing but show her grandmother how weak she was. She took a few deep breaths to gain control of her emotions. Throughout the argument she had tried as hard as she could to stress this fact to her grandmother, how important it was that she had to at least see the possibility that she could love the man she would marry, to respect him.
Her grandmother sat silently at her fathers desk across the room. For a moment Lily felt hope that was she was saying was getting through.
"Nothing I say or do?" She said softly, standing up slowly and coming around the desk towards Lily.
Her heart plummeted and she couldn't stop the shiver of fear that made its way down her back. The look in her grandmothers eyes reminded her of the same look Lord Malfoy had when Lord Potter had escorted her off the dance floor: fury.
"You think that the ideals of some little girl is going to stop me?" She was whispering, crossing the room slowly and silently. "You don't understand what you're up against here. Too many people are behind this marriage for me to put a stop to this even if I wanted to. But it's high time that you learnt that little girls don't always get what they want. You won't get the knight in shining armour, riding over the hills on his while stallion to save you from the dreaded monster. There's no one else out there to save you; your parents are dead, your cousin probably is too. Your sister and I are the last people alive who you are related too, and if I have to have you bound and gagged and dragged up that aisle you will marry that man. Your sister won't raise a finger to help you, and you will not humiliate me by turning this man down. If you do you will pay dearly for it."
Her grandmother had stopped in front of her. She too was breathing heavily, her nostrils flaring. Lily could feel little drops of spit hit her face and had to resist the urge to wipe them away.
"Already you have humiliated me, dancing with that man, Lord Potter." She spat the name in disgust. "You should have known not to dance with him."
Lily flinched, something that didn't go unnoticed by her grandmother. She started laughing, her voice high and brittle.
"Oh, so you thought that he wanted to dance with you because he thought you were beautiful. Men like him don't go for girls like you. Lord Malfoy knows him from his school years, but he and Lord Potter believe in two different things. Lord Potter, at the end of this, will be knocked off the high horse he and his family have placed themselves on and know true desperation.
Her grandmother paused, seeming to enjoy the look of horror and devastation on her granddaughters face.
"Tomorrow, you are going to come downstairs for breakfast in your best dress. Lord Malfoy will come by at 11 o'clock and you two will become officially engaged. We will start planning the wedding and you will be married before the season has ended. All you need to do is turn up, and if it's the last thing I do I will make sure you turn up."
Her grandmother gave her one last look and left the room. The door clicked softly as she left, leaving Lily to stare at her fathers desk remembering a time just one month ago, sitting in here with her family having breakfast. They had surprised her father because it was his birthday and he had been cooped up in the room working on paperwork all weekend. Everywhere she looked she was reminded of little moments like these, and these little moments also cemented her decision.
She would leave.
Talking hadn't gotten through to her grandmother, and since she had no intention of going through with the marriage, disappearing was the only option she had at that stage.
She also wasn't too bothered about the humiliation her grandmother would suffer.
Ok, she thought, trying to sort out her jumbled thoughts. What will I need? Clothes, money, food would be the most important things.
She waited for a moment, listening carefully to the footsteps outside the room fading away and walked over to her fathers desk, smiling as she crawled under it. Her grandmother didn't know about the hidden compartment under the desk. She herself had only found out about it a few months ago when her father showed her, telling her it was for emergencies in case anything happened to him and her mother.
I think this would most definitely count as an emergency, she thought, biting her lip and feeling around under the desk for the notch that opened the compartment.
With a click a small piece of wood popped out from the desk and inside she found a small amount of money, which she quickly gathered into a little pouch she made out of her handkerchief. Clearing out the rest of the compartment she pushed the little wooden piece back into the desk and left the room.
She could hear her grandmother again now, down the back of the house ordering the servants around to prepare for their guest tomorrow.
She wouldn't have much time. She knew she would have to leave before her grandmother went to bed. Once she was in bed no one would dare make a sound so as to not risk her grandmothers wrath.
Lily hurried upstairs, her pouch of money gripped tightly in her hand in case it made a sound.
She didn't want her grandmother catching onto what she was going to do. She was sure her grandmother already suspected that she would try something and would do anything to prevent her granddaughter from humiliating her.
As she reached the top of the stairs she went to turn left, to enter her own room but something caught her eye. She stared at the door across from her own, at the door of the room her younger cousin had been using.
Her cousin was four years younger than her, and had been staying with Lily's family after his parent had died from pneumonia earlier that year. While he had always been quite small, in the last few months he had grown so much that he was nearly taller than her, and he had slowly begin filling out, turning more into a man than a scrawny boy. In fact her mother had always joked at they had reached the stage where they could share each other's clothes.
The two of them had always reacted in disgust but Lily realised that this could work in her favour.
She hadn't quite figured out what she would do when she left, where she'd go or who she could ask for help finding her cousin and her parents. She only knew that she would have to go into hiding until she figured all that out.
What better way than to pretend to be a boy, she thought. She was small, and even with her slight curves she could pass as a young boy. The only problem would be her hair and her voice, but if she had people believing she was a young boy she might be able to convince them that she had not yet gained a deeper voice.
Just as she reached out a hand to grasp the door-handle leading to her cousins room she heard her grandmothers voice getting louder. Worried that she might catch her, Lily pushed the door open and closed it as quietly as she could behind her, wincing at the loud click the door made as she swung it shut.
She could hear her grandmothers feet padding softly up the stairs, and she slowly backed away from the door. Because the room was dark, Lily didn't see the pile of boxes full of her cousins things before it was too late. Lily backed into them with enough force to send the top three boxes crashing to the ground before tripping over and landing painfully on top of them.
"Shit," Lily groaned, rolling over and off the pile of boxes, her hand rubbing the spot where she had landed on the corner of one box. "Damn, what the hell are these doing in here?"
In the darkness she couldn't make out what had fallen out of the boxes. She was so focused on the pain in her side and getting away from the boxes, in case she knocked anything else down, when she looked up she saw a shadow appear and pause outside the door.
Lily felt like her heart stopped, this wasn't something she wanted too explain to her grandmother. Pushing herself up off the ground, wincing as she straightened up, she hurried to the outline she could make out of her cousins bed.
The door-handle rattled slightly as it was turned slowly and Lily lunged across the rest of the room and rolled under the bed. Lying on her stomach on the floor she saw the room become lighter.
Lily waited, frozen in fear and holding her breath, as she looked out from under the bed. She watched as a shadow appeared across the floor and a pair of feet paused at the entrance, moving slowly into the room. She pushed herself further under the bed, away from the light that was peaking through the sheets that hung off the side of the bed.
The person stopped at the fallen boxes, pushing aside some clothing that had fallen out, before moving further into the room and pausing by the side of the bed. Lily couldn't see anything past the outline of her grandmothers feet, and was so worried that about being found out she didn't dare move an inch.
Lily heard the rustling of fabric and sensed more than saw the person bending down, the sheet in front of her face being brushed aside.
But it did not go any further.
A crash sounded from the kitchen and the twitching sheets stilled. Her grandmother swore softly and pushed herself back up, leaving the room and slamming the door behind her.
Lily crawled awkwardly out from under the bed, having difficulty moving her legs around in her full skirt. She straightened up, using the bed as leverage and pulled herself the rest of the way out from under the bed before moving quickly back to the door. She paused only to pick up a small armful of clothes that lay sprawled across the floor.
She waited at the closed door, pressing her ear against it and, not hearing anything on the other side, slipped out of the room and into the relative safety of her own.
She moved swiftly, grabbing a small fabric bag to hold the money she got from her fathers desk and some spare clothes. She would have to leave soon, get as far away from here as she possibly could before her grandmother raised the alarm and others began looking for her. She don't want to make it any easier for them, and this whole exercise would be pointless if they dragged her back here in a weeks time and she haven't even left the city.
There may have been plenty of places she could hide and not have to pretend to be a man, but she knew it would also be easier to move when others knew less about her than needed. But where she was planning on going, being a man is the only way she could stay there.
Lily walked over to the pile of clothes and started sorting through them, grabbing enough shirts and pants that she thought would fit herself and keep a few as spare.
She had heard the rumours from her fathers workers, the rumours about Lord Malfoy's connections. Some said that he supports the pirate that fights to overthrow the crown, that his father has pirates working for him to help get rid of those who gets in his sons way. Lily couldn't shake the possibility that if her grandmother was so insistent on her marrying Lord Malfoy, and with her grandmothers' husbands close ties to Lord Malfoy's father, what's to say she didn't use his connections to get rid of her cousin. Richard had been the last person in line to inherit her fathers business.
A business that supplied much needed ships to the King himself.
A few minutes later there was a knock at the door and Lily looked up from where she sat on the edge of her bed as her grandmother let herself in the room without waiting for a response, carrying a small tray of bread and cheese.
Lily knew her grandmother would come by again that night to make sure Lily knew her place, so she had hidden her bag under the bed so that she would be ready to leave as soon as her grandmother had left the room.
The only problem she had come across was getting out of the ball gown she wore. She had already combed her soft red hair and pinned it back behind her head. The clothes she was going to wear that night were hidden under the blanket on her bed.
"Grandmother," she said coldly, and stood up to face the window.
Her grandmother didn't say anything at first, placing the food tray on the dressing table and beginning to undo the buttons on Lily's dress, before then unlacing the corset. Lily gave a small sigh as she found she could breath again.
She turned back to face her grandmother and the two watched each other emotionlessly. Lily was careful to hide her anger at her grandmother in case she sensed that Lily was up to something and became more suspicious. Her grandmother looked back at her just as watchfully and pursed her lips.
"Don't bother hiding anything," she said softly. "I know you're up to something."
Lily didn't respond. She's just fishing, she thought, she knows you're going to do something, but she isn't sure what.
Frustration showed briefly on her grandmothers face.
"If you think even for a second that you can go up against me, think again. If I can get rid of that weak little cousin of yours, I can get rid of you."
Lily was barely able to stop her mouth from falling open.
"So you did have something to do with Richards disappearance," she cried.
Her grandmother snorted.
"Of course. With your parents out the way, he was the only one left to dispose of. I imagine he didn't last very long with the men I left him with." She smiled cruelly. "Don't think for a second you have anyone on your side anymore. In the end you'll be glad I've done what I had to. Don't fight what has already been decided and you will come out of this better than anyone else."
"Never will I not fight," she told her grandmother. "If you make me marry that man, never will I forgive you, or forget what you made me do."
Lily could feel herself shaking from the anger that was building up inside her. She held her hands clenched at her side, her hands balled into fists and her nails digging into her palms.
Her grandmother smiled and lifted her hand to place it softly against her granddaughters cheek. Lily didn't have time to react as her grandmother pulled back her hand and swung it across her granddaughters face.
The cracking sound of the slap echoed around the room. Pain exploded across Lily's cheek on impact, but she made sure to hold her ground, staring her grandmother in the eye, doing her best to not show her weakness. Neither wanted to be the first to back down, but Lily could feel tears welling up in her eyes from the pain and quickly looked away.
Her grandmother laughed, the sound shrill and demented to Lily's ears, and left the room.
The door clicked shut behind her and Lily heard the unmistakable sound of a lock clicking in place.
A sob burst unwilling from Lily as she looked at her reflection in the mirror. A red mark, the exact same size and shape of her grandmothers hand stood out on her cheek against her pale white skin. The colour of her hair seemed to match that of the mark on her cheek.
If anything, her grandmothers actions cemented Lily's resolve.
Wiping the back of her hand across her face to get rid of the tears, she threw back the bed covers and changed into her cousins clothes, before putting her cousins hat on and making sure to shove all her hair up under the cap. She grabbed the bag out from under the bed, the food off the tray and hurried to her window.
Wasting no time, she climbed out the window and perched for a brief moment on the sill, before carefully sliding down to grab the wooden trellis that her father used to grow vines up the side of the house. She used to do this years before when she had been younger and wanted to play with the other neighbourhood children, not cooped up inside with the tutor her parents had hired, but she hadn't done it for years and for a second Lily's gut clenched at what she was about to do.
Living in the city, when space was a precious commodity, many families were lucky if they had even the smallest garden, so while Lily's parents were far from the rich that frequented the balls that evening, they were still well off enough to live in a place with a small garden attached to the side of the house.
Lily took a deep calming breath and began climbing down the trellis. It only took her a moment to reach a safe enough height where she was able to jump the rest of the way down, as climbing in a pair of pants was a whole lot easier than in a dress.
She was startled when a light was turned on behind her and threw herself to the side so as to not be seen. She forced herself to breath normally when she realised the light was coming from the open window nearest the gate leading from the garden.
A window Lily would have to get past to get out of the garden.
Moving closer she peered inside and she realised her grandmother was in there with a number of men she didn't recognize, and another woman. Her grandmother was talking quickly to the men and Lily paused long enough to look at them all.
The woman stood on the far side of the room with one of the men. She had long curly black hair that didn't look as though it was regularly brushed, and wore a full dress that was also different shades of black. If it weren't for her pale, almost translucent skin and the fact that she kept laughing for apparently no reason, Lily would have almost missed her.
The man she stood with looked just as wild as she did, with big broad shoulders and hair that Lily could easily imagine covered his entire body, if his face was anything to go by.
The last man stood by the crackling fireplace with his back to the window, and when he spoke Lily thought he sounded almost like a snake. The colour of the firelight seemed to reflect in his own pale skin.
Not wanting to waste any more time, and worried that these people would leave and see her as she made her escape, Lily crouched down and crawled across the grass under the window. She had only made it halfway when the voice of the snake sounding man seemed to get louder.
Her heart beating loudly in her chest, which Lily thought for sure everyone would be able to hear, she froze and didn't dare look up in case she caught his attention.
But the man kept speaking, and soon the voice receded. Lily didn't waste another moment, crawling the rest of the way before jumping up and running across the rest of the garden and out the gate, careful to stay in the shadows cast by the moonlight.
She ran through the streets, not looking back, stopping only when she was out of breath and the smell of the ocean was strong enough that she knew she wasn't far away.
Lily, with her father in the business of building ships, had been to the major shipping port in London more times than she could remember. Because of this though, she also knew which part of the port was more unsavory than the rest, and while at night the whole port would be questionable one in particular area she could remember her father pointing out many times warning her to never go there.
"That is where the pirates, and anyone doing something illegal, usually dock," he had warned when she'd asked why he never went over there. "No honest man would go over there when other honest men were looking."
And that was exactly where Lily intended to go.
Lily reached the port a few minutes later, having ducked past the office of her fathers business and kept her head down incase anyone was to recognise her, she was now peaking around the corner of a small building that sat off to one side of the port that only 'unsavory types' ever went. At this time of night the whole area was buzzing as men loaded and unloaded cargo from the dozens of ships moored there.
A shout from the far side caught her attention and she watched as men scattered as a rope attached to a huge box snapped, causing the box to fall over 50ft down to the wooden dock below. Lily could hear angry shouting from one of the men on the ship, and answering shouts from other men as they worked out who was to blame for the accident.
Lily took a deep breath and focused back on the ship docked not far from the small building she hid behind.
She had been watching the ship for the last few minutes trying to tell if it was a pirate ship. One thing her father had never been able to tell her was what a pirate and pirate ship looked like. All he had said was that she was unlikely to ever need to know, and the pirates were unlikely to advertise what they were in a port like this.
"I really wish I'd asked more questions," Lily grumbled to herself.
The men hanging around this ship, having finished preparing it to leave the port now seemed just to be waiting for something, or someone. She couldn't tell for sure, but they seemed to match her idea of pirates better than anyone else there. And they didn't look too rough either…
Moving back into the shadows, Lily took a deep breath to calm her nerves and squared her shoulders, and forced herself to leave the shadows of the building to march towards the rowdy men. She walked along the dock and clenched her fists to keep them from shaking, and stopped as she reached the gangplank leading up to the ship.
The men on board didn't notice her at first and she ducked out the way as a bottle of ale came flying over the ships rail.
She cleared her throat to try to get someone's attention but it was lost as a roar of laughter went through the ship and a splash on the far side indicated that someone had gotten a bit too tipsy.
"Excuse me," Lily called out then, thinking maybe that wasn't something a man would say, tried again. "Oi!"
Still nothing and Lily was about to start walking up the gangplank when a large hand clamped down on her shoulder and pulled her out of the way of a couple of men carrying large boxes of what smelled like food. They clambered up the gangplank and disappeared over the side.
Lily looked up at the giant of a man who towered over her and felt her breath catch in her throat. The man was nearly twice as tall as her, she couldn't tell for sure but he had to be at least 8ft tall. His face was mostly hidden behind a mop of long coarse curly hair and a beard that reached his chest. His hand was as big as her head.
She nearly jumped out of her skin when he spoke, his voice deep and friendly.
"Watch yeh head lass," he boomed. "One good knock an' yeh'd end up in the drink."
Lily nodded but didn't say anything. She wasn't sure what to say at this stage and stepped back a bit further as more men came along the dock and up to the ship. She could see four more men standing at the end of the dock, who appeared to be arguing amongst themselves over something.
"Wha' did yeh want?" The giant boomed again, catching Lily's attention again. "No' lost are yeh?"
"Uh, n-no." Lily was angry with herself for stuttering and forced herself to continue. "I wanted to join yeh… I mean your crew."
"Wha' was tha' lass?"
"Hagrid," someone from the ship shouted. "Where'd you get too?"
A couple of people appeared at the rails and looked down at Lily and the giant, who she assumed to be Hagrid.
"I'm helpin' this boy here, he's lost." Hagrid was patting Lily on the head this time and she hunched her shoulder to try to get away.
"No, I'm not lost," she said but the pirates continued on as thought she hadn't spoken. Well to be fair, she thought, they probably hadn't heard me.
"He's lost? Where does he want to go?"
"No, stop I…" She stopped as she was cut off again.
"I dun know, I hadn' asked him."
"Well ask him then." More men had come to the ships rails,
"I wanted to join your crew," she finally shouted, pushing Hagrids hand off her head.
The men stopped laughing and an awkward silence seemed to settle over the ship.
"Ahh, well yeh see, yeh'd have to ask the capt'n tha'," Hagrid said, and before she could respond he pulled her around to where the men who had been arguing earlier now stood.
Lily's voice caught in her throat as she looked at the two men in the lead. They were both tall, though one was clearly taller than the other. The shorter of the two had long silky black hair and grey eyes. He wore black breeches and black books, with an oversized white shirt tucked into his pants.
But it was the taller of the two men who captured Lily's attention and it was all she could do to stop her mouth from dropping open in shock. Lord James Potter stood in front of her, wearing black breeches, large black boots, a white shirt, over which he wore a fitted grey coat.
Unmistakably a pirate. Unmistakable the man she had only met earlier that evening.
"What's this about joining our crew?" James looked down at the, very, small man who stood quivering in front of him. The small boy wore clothes that were obviously too large for him, and which would not fit in on a pirate ship. He wore a dark brown hat, from which he could see wisps of red hair poking out from under. He stared at the smaller man, feeling almost a sense of déjà vu but he couldn't pinpoint exactly why.
"I want to join your crew," Lily said again. She shook her head to try to clear the confusion she had at seeing James Potter as a pirate. She couldn't understand how the man she had spoken too only earlier that evening could be standing here in front of her as though he belonged here.
"Only for a short while, you understand," she continued before he could say anything. "I'm looking for someone."
"We don't just let anyone and everyone board this ship," James growled suspiciously. Having been on the seas for nearly six months now, and having worked as a spy for nearly four years before that, he knew when someone was hiding something, and he sensed the little boy in front of him was definitely hiding something. He wouldn't put it past the man whom they hunted to plant a spy of his own in his enemy's crew. "I can't have a crew member who is more focused on looking for someone than on the job at hand."
"I'll do everything I can to help around the ship…" Lily began.
A shout of laughter came from the crew leaning over the rails, though none as loud as the one from the giant beside her.
"Yeh don' look like yeh could lift a sack o' flour lass," Hagrid howled, wiping a tear of laughter from the corner of his eye.
Lily felt her anger rising and feel her cheeks warming up in response to their laughter.
"All I need is a way to get to other ports," she snapped at the men.
"Then pay for passage like normal folk," James said dismissively.
Lily narrowed her eyes at the taller man as he brushed past her towards the ship. She got a whiff of the musky smell she had smelt on him earlier.
"I don't know exactly where the person I'm looking for is, but I know he wouldn't be with those 'normal folk'. He's with a crew like you lot."
James looked back at Lily from his point half way up the gangplank.
"There are plenty of pirate crews out there, what makes you think joining up with us will get you to where you need to go?"
Lily lifted her chin defiantly to look up at him.
"It's all I have at the moment to go on."
Lily's grandmother looked up from the small cup of tea she was drinking from as her granddaughters maid reappeared on the dining room doorway.
Her lips thinned when she saw that her granddaughter was not with her.
"Where is she?" She snapped to the maid.
The maid flinched.
"She's not there ma'am…"
"What do you mean 'she's not there'? Of course she's there, where else could she be."
"No ma'am, the room is empty. The door was locked like you said but the window was left open."
She looked at the maid in horror and her teacup slipped unnoticed from her fingers and shattered on the wooden table below.
"No…" She whispered. She had locked the door specifically so that Lily wouldn't be able to do anything. She didn't think Lily would go so far as to climb out her bedroom window.
A knock came from the front door and the family butler was quick to usher the expected guest into the guest room.
"Clean that up," she ordered the maid.
She thought quickly, deciding what to do but knowing that the only way at that stage to find her granddaughter and bring her back to where she belonged was to tell the truth.
You brought this on yourself you stupid girl, she thought grimly.