Disclaimer: I do not own Beauty and the Beast, Pirates of the Caribbean, or Assassin's Creed.

Vanessa, 1767

More shuddering rocked the ship. Vanessa noticed that Jack Sparrow had braced himself in a corner, and followed his example. Distantly, they heard shots fired, and then the deeper boom of a single cannon.

Jack was muttering to himself, and occasionally Vanessa caught a word here or there. "Hold steady…starboard guns…send the monkey…"

It didn't make much sense, and she feared for a moment he'd gone mad. Then he said, perfectly clearly, "I don't suppose you have anything useful hidden in that dress of yours in case the opportunity to escape presents itself?"

"I beg your pardon?" asked Vanessa coldly.

"Thought not, but I had to ask."

The shots from above ceased. Then a terrible, booming voice echoed through the water, a voice so deep it shook the ship's timbers. Try as she might, Vanessa could not quite work out what was being said. But she guessed who—or what—the voice might belong to, and her heart gave a strange leap. Why would he be here? Surely not for her. He would be pleased that she had left his island at last. How would he know she needed…

Her thoughts were interrupted by pounding boots. Down came another member of the crew she did not recognize.

"You're to come wiv'me, Miss Swift," he said hastily, unlocking the cell. "The Captain's wanting you on deck."

Without turning around, Vanessa could feel Jack's presence behind her. "Perhaps I should accompany the lady. For her own safety."

He fell silent as the other man cocked a loaded pistol in his face. "Shuddup," the man snarled, unnecessarily, "You stay where you are, Jack Sparr'a."

"Captain. Captain Jack Sparrow," Jack muttered, but he let the man remove Vanessa from the brig without further protest. Vanessa would, in fact, have been somewhat grateful for his presence, if only to give her courage with his own bravado. She threw him a frightened look over her shoulder, but he flicked his eyes at the gun still trained at his head, then shrugged.

The brig door was slammed and latched, and Vanessa dragged towards the ladder. Just as she was climbing it, she heard Jack shout, "We're not finished, Miss Mouse!"

Vanessa doubted she would ever see him again, but she was denied the chance to answer in any case. She was hustled up the ladder, and then two flights of stairs towards the deck.

"What's going on?" she ventured.

The man didn't answer, but in the better light she saw that he was white under his tan. Whatever it was, and she was more and more certain she knew, it was something to frighten even a hardened pirate.

"Ah, thar she be," she heard Barbossa's voice say as she emerged into the sunlight. After the darkness of the hold, she could see little beyond a few shapes that might be more crew members rushing about. The Black Pearl itself seemed to be lurching violently in all directions. If Vanessa hadn't still been somewhat used to the rocking of the Lady Swan in storm, she might have been sick at the constant tilting.

A dark shape loomed over her, and she vaguely made out Barbossa's features.

"What's going on?" she asked again. "What do you want with me?"

"Unfortunately for you, miss, it's not what I want with ye. It's what he wants," the man said, leading her over to the side. Her vision had adjusted enough that she could see the enormous white shape of the Leviathan circling the Black Pearl without cease. It was the wake of his bulk that was causing the ship to rock so.

A strange emotion tugged at Vanessa's chest. It seemed he had come for her after all. Looking closer, she saw something else. Following close in the Leviathan's wake were several smaller creatures similar to the one who had left her just before the Black Pearl appeared. So that was how he knew. He must be able to communicate with sea animals. They had gone to tell him of her trouble, and he had come…to save her?

Struggling to keep the unbidden smile from her face, she quavered "What is that…that thing?" To her own ears, she sounded quite convincing. It was not difficult to feign terror upon seeing the Leviathan, even if she knew—hoped—he was not there to harm her.

Barbossa did not answer. It was one of the other crewman, a thin fellow with a missing eye, who whispered "The Leviathan. The Devourer. Legends say it's a giant, immortal shark that swallows whole ships into its jaws, sailors and all. When it's feeling peckish, at least. But no one ever sees it unless it's out…hunting." He exchanged glances with another crewman, a shorter balding man, then both clutched their weapons tighter with looks of horror on their faces.

"Bah," said Barbossa, not troubling to keep his voice down. "We've faced worse, haven't we, gents? There's not a monster living as can take the Pearl for long. But," here he turned to Vanessa, "the creature's been demanding you, Miss Swift. Just that, and he says he'll leave us in peace. Have you seen the thing before?"

"N-no," she stammered, hoping he wouldn't see her lie.

"Then how could the beast know of you?"

"I d-don't know."

"Maybe he's hungry for the taste of fresh maiden. Don't see them too often in these parts," offered one of the crew, to a few ribald, if weak, chuckles. Vanessa's stomach churned, and she prayed she was not wrong about the Leviathan's intentions towards her.

"So I see two choices before me," said Barbossa, not really addressing any of them but seemingly thinking aloud. "Either I give him what he wants and Miss Swift sleeps with the fishes, so to speak. Or, I decide our little find is too precious a commodity to give up. She knows of the Fountain. And there hasn't been a monster yet the Pearl couldn't outlast if it came to that." Graciously, he turned to Vanessa. "Miss Swift, what would ye prefer?"

Vanessa opened and closed her mouth. If she said she preferred to go to the Leviathan, he would know she had lied and there was some connection between them. What frightened girl willingly would go to her death to save a crew of pirates who had held her in the brig? And yet, if she said she preferred to stay, he might take her at her word. That would surely lead to a fight, and despite Barbossa's boasts the Pearl did not look as though she could sustain the damage the Leviathan could inflict. There was nothing she could say.

Barbossa must have seen the panic in her eyes, because he chuckled. "It's quite all right, Miss Swift. It so happens I'll take the decision out of your hands. I'm not just ready to give up a prize such as ye, I simply brought ye here to see what connection there might be between ye and the creature. Lock'er back in the brig!" he commanded the man who still held Vanessa's arm. "For the rest of ye scurvy dogs, all hands to the guns!"

"Aye, Captain!" they roared back, though Vanessa could see many of them still looked nervous. Then a hand yanked her arms so viciously that she cried out in pain.

There was a roar from the water that made even the air tremble. Several men gathered on one side of the deck to fire their smaller muskets at the water. The rest had sprung to load the cannons. Chaos was everywhere as the entire ship prepared for war.

Another sharp yank brought Vanessa stumbling to her knees just as the ship rocked even more violently than before. In the moment of surprise at this unexpected motion she felt her captor's hands loosen. With sudden decision she yanked away and sprinted for the side of the ship.

She had half-climbed the rail before she got a glimpse of the water. It was churning and boiling at the Leviathan's wrath—and then he came into view. That huge, wickedly pointed fin; the massive white shape beneath the surface.

She hesitated.

Too long. Her captor had not been far behind to begin with, and her pause was all he needed. She felt his hands start to grab her around the waist to pull her back into captivity.

"Help!" she screamed.

She saw a black glitter amidst a white background: the Leviathan's eye, breaking the waterline and seeing her there at the rail straining against someone. With a deft flick of his tail, he propelled himself almost sideways into the ship.

The Black Pearl lurched; her timbers groaned with the force. Vanessa's captor slipped in his grip on her and fell back to the deck. Vanessa herself lost her balance and pitched headfirst into the water with a shriek.

The shock of impact stunned her for a few moments. When her head cleared and she realized where she was, instinct took over. She began to thrash, but she wasn't sure which way was up and which was down anymore.

Flashing gray bodies surrounded her. They buoyed her up to the surface with an accompanying chorus of squeaks and clicks that sounded very loud in the water. When she had wiped the water from her eyes, she found herself inches from a massive, pointed white nose. Flinging herself backwards with a cry of terror, she inhaled water and had to spend a few seconds choking on it. When she could see again what was in front of her was the tall pointed fin. It sat without moving while Vanessa stared.

Explosions went off overhead, and bullets began splashing around them. A fierce, beaklike nose—one of the grey creatures—shoved Vanessa hard in the small of her back, forcing her to clutch the fin or have her own nose be driven into it. Immediately, the Leviathan began swimming, slowly and in such a way that his fin stayed above water so she could hold on without too much trouble.

From her vantage point she could see several small wounds trailing red blood against the Leviathan's bright white flesh. Of course. He was too large to have avoided all their fire.

She looked ahead, and blinked. A familiar shoreline stretched before her: the Leviathan's shore. Blinking again, she looked back. The Black Pearl still loomed against the horizon with men swarming like ants on her deck and rigging. How could she not have seen the land from its deck? She had never been that far from it all along.

There was a muffled boom and a puff of smoke from the Pearl. Vanessa watched the ball start to fall, straight at them.

"Look out!" she screamed.

The Leviathan twisted, nearly dislodging her, so that he could see the danger. He flipped in the water so that she found herself clutching his fin upside down, underwater and completely disoriented. She did not understand what had taken place until there was a concussion in the water above her.

A terrible scream shook her to her bones.

Oh, God! By some miracle, she fought her way to the surface.

The massive form of the Leviathan was gone from beside her. In its place was his half-man form, floating helplessly on the ocean surface, black eyes shut. He was even whiter than usual, and blood was flowing from an enormous gash in his shoulder. It was so deep that when the water washed away the blood for a moment or two she could see more white that looked like bone. He was also covered with many tiny scratches as if he had been rolling in particularly rough sand.

Vanessa looked about her frantically. They were surrounded by the flashing gray forms of the Leviathan's companions, who were nudging them both. There were cheers echoing across the water from the Black Pearl, which she could only assume meant they thought they had made their kill. Reasonable, as their large target had vanished from sight. She could no longer see land anywhere near, but she had to do something. She seized her injured companion's good arm.

The island shimmered into view again like a mirage coming in to focus. Vanessa shook her head. Magic. Or some sort of devilry. She had never quite believed the tales that spoke of magic and monsters, but she could no longer ignore the evidence of her eyes. There was something at work here in the Caribbean that was not part of the world she knew, but there was no time to dwell on her wonderment.

She looked at the gray creatures. "Can—can you get us to shore?" she ventured. One of them made a motion disturbingly like a nod—learned from the Leviathan perhaps?—and within moments Vanessa found herself clutching one of them as they sped to land.

Sooner than she would have believed possible Vanessa was dragging the half-man half-shark onto shore. He began to tremble violently when he was completely out of the water, however, so she was forced to move him back so that his webbed feet were in the surf.

She examined his wound; but really had no idea what to do with it. She was a good sick nurse from years of experience with her mother but wounds were something else altogether.

There was some sand rimming it from her efforts to get him on shore, so she took salt water in her cupped hands and poured it over the area.

He screamed when she did that. Vanessa barely restrained herself from leaping backwards at the sight of his teeth. This time she ran off to the stream to collect some water from that, but could not return without it dripping from her hands. Growling under her breath in frustration, she looked around for something to use. Spying a coconut that had been split open in its fall from a nearby tree and dried in the sun, she seized it. It easily filled with water. The Leviathan did not object to her treatment of his wound with water fetched this way.

Once the wound was clean she wondered what to do. Blood was still flowing freely, and she did know that loosing so much was bad. Her dress, filthy wreck that it was, was all she had.

The dress was so pitifully thin and damaged it was easy to tear part of it into strips. As she tore, she noticed the scratch on her leg from the previous day. Or what had been the scratch. If the tear in her skirt had not been there, she would never have known she had been hurt. She ran her finger along where it should have been with a frown. Then she took up her first strip and reached for the Leviathan's arm.

A pale hand grabbed her wrist.

"Stop."

Author's Note: I've been on a writing kick recently, and surprisingly had some free time to do it. This last chapter was tough to write because I saw what I wanted in my head but had trouble describing it. How well did I do?

SamoaPhoenix9