She brings to life such ideas in my head, all sort of delicious imaginings that I am all too quick to seize upon and make real. And with each thorough tasting, my cravings, the hunger that the princess stirs inside me, only grows stronger, wilder, that mad maelstrom of desire an unstoppable, unquenchable force. What is it about this woman, this princess, that spurs my lust so? That make me think and do things that go beyond my comprehension of what is right and what is wrong? Is it the combination of her sweet sensuality and her looks? That wide eyed innocence that is nothing at all like the poison influence that is her father's own brand of sinister evil?

It's simply something that I can't answer, the only certainty in my heart that of the temptation to take my sweetly despoiled little virgin for a third time in less than twenty four hours. I know it would be beyond cruel, and yet I almost can't stop myself. Almost don't WANT to, the sweet trembling of her lip's kiss, flaring the need to life inside me, my hands already moving to push her down. She fights me every inch of the way, those delicate hands of hers curling into fists that she then beats lightly at my chest with. It's not any real attempt to dissuade me, Belle simply too frightened of me to make a true show of refusal. It's there in the way that she trembles, in the way that she flinches back, and tries to knock sense into me with such a gentle touch. I'm conflicted by that fear, one twisted half aroused by it, while another, softer, kinder part of me feels a sad kind of sorrow at what I've become, a sexual deviant that takes pleasure in forcing himself on a woman.

I suppose I should be angry, though as to who I should ultimately direct this sort of feeling towards, I am not entirely sure. At Belle for luring me into this brand of misconduct, or at her father for being the ruin of everything that I've ever held dear, or even at myself for letting go of the final vestige of my remaining honor last night? The one thing that is clear? That it's a new brand of monster that I've become, some insatiable fiend who won't ever be satisfied with just one night. Her words linger, not so much in my ears, as in my heart, Belle's voice aghast as she had protested that I couldn't mean to KEEP her.

I realize then, that yes, yes I do. And it's a million kinds of wrong, the rasping harshness of my breath suddenly filling the room, as I tear free of the kiss and of her. Her wide eyed surprise, those trembling lips, the way that she looks splayed across my bed wearing nothing but my shirt, it all makes me actively war against myself, my shaking right hand scrubbing across my face in a betraying sign of my agitation.

Neither of us say a word. Belle's simply too frightened or stunned, and I? I simply don't trust myself in the moment. If I'm at all honest, I haven't for a while now, for the wildness that I feel, that and the desire that was birthed that first instant that I had looked into her eyes, making all my carefully laid plans spiral out of control. I've been crazed because of it, angry because of it, and I've hurt her because of it. I can't justify it, and I certainly can't make amends for it, or the many other things that I have done and intend to still do. Belle's only a small part of my vengeance, and there's still so much to be done before I can finally live up to my promise to Liam. That promise and the debt that I owe him, are not something that will be easily appeased by one virgin's blood. There's a whole kingdom's worth of pain to inflict, a hundred and one ways to continue dismantling Maurice's greedy grasp at a legacy of domination and tyranny. Death is too good for an evil like that King, Maurice a man that not only needs to suffer, but most assuredly has earned it.

Each day and with every strike against him, I come closer to his complete ruin. I won't be satisfied until the kingdom turns against him, until his own people drive him out of Avonlea with their knives and flaming pitchforks. It won't just end with Maurice stripped of his crown and his kingdom, I want him hated, hunted, harassed for the rest of his miserable life. I want him to never again know a minute's rest, to never again have any allies, power, or the money to secure the illusion of safety. I want him to cower, to be afraid, and I want him to at last know the real reason behind all his misfortunes. I want to look right into his eyes, to be there when Maurice finally realizes that not all dead stay buried.

The vengeance that cries out an insistent beat inside of me, has never once given consideration to what I will do AFTER. It's never even come close to letting me try to picture what life will be like once revenge is mine, once the King is utterly ruined and stripped free of all he has ever known. It still doesn't, and perhaps that is a grim foreshadow of the emptiness that I will ultimately face once my sole purpose in life has been achieved.

With no real purpose and no real reason left to me, is that the reason why I react so strongly to the idea of keeping the princess? Do I look to her for a lifeline, someone to cling to once Maurice has been brought to justice by his people? Or do I think her the balm that will soothe the savage that is inside me, the filthy pirate that I now am? I nearly laugh out loud at that, sick with the irony that my every touch forced on her strips me of any right of just that.

She maintains her watchful stare the entire time I debate myself. Those beautiful blue eyes gleam with a wet sheen, one lone tear slipping down across one perfect cheek. Belle bites at her bottom lip as she looks at me, still so scared to otherwise move. It's a wise council that the princess takes from her fear, for even I, myself, can't predict just how I'll react. That she makes me want things is a fact, the princess a weakness I am ill equip to prepare for. I do the only wise thing that I can, retreating from her and the bed, while I make light of my mood.

"Keep laying there so inviting, and I'll forget that I've duties that Smee insists I attend to." She seems to pale in understanding, visibly trembling in place atop the bed and it's blankets. I smirk at her while inwardly fighting a groan, quick to turn my back on her as I go to put on the rest of my clothing. My shirt covers the many wounds that I now have, both from the crew's fighting last night, and from the princess' own nails. Both are badge of honors in their own twisted ways, and both are ones I might normally flaunt if the tension aboard the ship wasn't already so high.

"Rest up." I advised her, buckling my sword belt into place around me. Over it goes my long leather coat, the garment falling into place in such a way that the silver handle of my sword lays out in the open revealed for an easy drawing. I make sure of it just to be safe, practicing drawing my weapon several times from different positions before I am satisfied.

Less satisfying is her silence, as though the princess's voice had been stolen along with her lips. My irritation shows in the sidelong glance that I give her, some perverse part of me wanting to needle her into a reaction. "You'd best keep your strength up princess, for the long nights are ahead of you."

I don't get her voice, though I do get the sight of her narrowing a glare at me. For all that I've done to Belle, for all the hurt that I've inflicted, there's still some spark of open defiance within her. For this morning, this moment, I am happy to see it. In fact, the angrier she grows, the wider my smile becomes, my arm sweeping out in an exaggerated gesture, as I give a mocking bow to her.

She waits until I shut the door behind me, before I hear the thump of something soft hitting the wall. I grin harder in response, wondering what sort of reception I will face once the princess has had time to stew in her anger some.

"You're looking happy this morning." A quiet voice says from the shadows to the side of me. Immediate is my reaction, the sword drawn as I put the door to my back. The shadows shift, an ebony skin colored man stepping out into the light.

"Sevastian." I breathe out a name, but don't quite relax my guard. The ebony colored pirate looks at me with approval, and it's not just his dark brown eyes that are taking in my every detail.

"I didn't believe it." Sevastian offers to me, holding up both his hands in surrender. He's not made harmless for an instant, those thick, muscular arms of his quite capable of beating, bashing, even breaking a man in half. "When Smee made mention of the fact you actually seemed to be HAPPY this morning….."

"Smee talks too much for his own good." I grumble, and carefully shift so I can keep one wary eye on Sevastian while I attempt to lock my bedroom door.

"That he does, but it doesn't change the fact that what he said is true."

"Is it?" I challenge, satisfied when I heard the click of the locked door. I then quickly put the key into the cavernous depths of one pocket.

"I saw you." Sevastian solemnly points out. "With a grin that spread from ear to ear, a sight I haven't seen in many a year. Not since…."

"Not since Liam died." I finish for him. We both go silent at that, giving up honor to Liam by taking a quiet moment to think fondly of him.

"He was a good captain." Sevastian finally says. "A good brother…."

"A good MAN." I point out in retort. "He was taken too soon from this world..."

"That he was." Sevastian agrees, and the rest of my guarded tension leaves me. Brother in arms for far longer than we had been pirates, there was very little true chance of Sevastian meaning any lasting harm towards me.

"What is the mood of what is left of our crew?"

"Besides angry, surly and horny?" Sevastian counters with a question. "As ugly as it's ever been, especially with Smee letting slip the news of your good mood."

I grumbled something under my breath about punishing Smee for his overly talkative ways. Sevastian grinned in a good natured manner, laughing it off as just talk. He knew as well as I did, that the debt I owed Smee and Sevastian both, would keep me from truly hurting either one of them. The same couldn't be said for most of the rest of my crew, many of the men who now sailed with me pirates who had never been loyal to any king or kingdom. Those who had, had all been members of the original crew of the Jewel of the Ream, those few men having borne bold witness to the evils King Maurice was capable of.

Indeed they hadn't just borne witness to it, they had lived through it, surviving many a horror done to themselves, to their friends, even to their families. Innocents had been killed, countless made into sacrifice as both punishment and as cover for one man's twisted ambitions. Liam and the many others lost, weigh heavily on us all, a blood debt owed, that could only be paid in kind.

Stained as our hands were by all that blood, we were dirty in a way that was different from Maurice. That King's evil stemmed from a greedy desire for more of everything, riches, power, land. While ours? Ours was borne from the need for justice. That honorable need would never truly excuse us, the many innocents like the princess caught in the crossfire of this vendetta, hurt by it, suffering because of it, even laying dead as a result of it.

More would be sacrificed. The entire ocean's already cramped bottom, would be littered with the many unsalvageable wrecks of the ships that I and my crew continued to sink. And with each ship destroyed, so went more of Avonlea's hopes, Maurice growing more desperate by the hour as every form of aide fell short of reaching him. That kingdom was doomed, it's king cursed, and soon there wouldn't be anyone left to extend a hand or their support to Maurice and Avonlea.

My lips curled with the thought, a malevolent smirk that held no true pleasure to my expression. It was fact that the ruin of Avonlea was a necessary evil. The people of that kingdom needed to know true fear and suffering, needed a helping hand to push them to overthrow Maurice from his throne. The kingdom itself probably wouldn't survive, Avonlea broken up into smaller territories, as it's neighbors fought to take control of every bit of land. What was already one vulture, would become many, custom and culture lost to greed and fighting. The princess wouldn't even have a home to return to when all was said and done, no one of Avonlea would.

It couldn't be helped. Maurice needed to be stopped. Not just stopped, he need to be made accountable for all he had done, all the evil he had yet to pay for.

"And why shouldn't I be in a good mood?" I wonder out loud to Sevastian. "We've stolen another victory out from under ole' Maurice's nose. Let's see him make that alliance now without his only bargaining chip!"

"Some would say that very bargaining chip is WHY you are in such a good mood." Sevastian countered with a grin. "Is the princess as sweet a treat as she looks?"

"Even sweeter." I retort, and something about my expression must soften. Sevastian stops, and gives me his total regard, those chocolate colored eyes piercing me as though they could read into my thoughts, my heart, my very soul.

"This is more than a good mood."

"What do you mean?" I ask, and feel unsettled by the words that the pirate then gives me.

"You really ARE happy."

"Happy…?" I shake my head in denial, happiness and any form of it's joy, feelings long since killed off inside me. What had started with Liam's death, had snuffed out fully in that shallow grave, leaving behind only slivers of a perverse pleasure that nurtured to life each time I thought of Maurice's ultimate suffering and comeuppance.

"You misunderstand." I continue. "This is not happiness. This is…..satisfaction."

"Satisfaction eh?" Sevastian snorted at that. "It damn well comes off as happy to me." His eyes dance with his laughter, Sevastian grinning. "There's no need to feel ashamed of it." He adds. "There's nothing wrong in enjoying a beautiful woman, in letting her lift up your spirits."

"My spirits weren't the thing that was lifted." I snap but Sevastian only outright laughs in response.

"Killian." He says once the laughter has died. With a somber look, he clasps a hand carefully onto my shoulder. "Your brother Liam wouldn't want you to be miserable. He wouldn't want you to not live your life to it's fullest potential."

"Liam is dead." I coldly retort, shrugging off that friendly hand.

"That doesn't mean you have to be too." Sevastian counters. "I didn't dig you up out of that grave only to watch you squander away your second chance at life!"

"I thought you craved vengeance almost as much as I do. Has that changed?" I demand.

"No, of course it hasn't." He quickly affirms. "But I don't see how the best revenge can't in part be by living life to it's fullest."

"And just how will that lead to Maurice's ruin? How will living my life and being happy see justice served on him. It's not just Liam as you well know, there's so many lost that demand the debt be repaid in kind. Your daughter, your wife…."

Those dark eyes sobered with his sorrow. "You needn't remind me." The breath exhaled out of him in a weighty sigh. "I'll never forget, and I'll never forgive." I start to nod in response, but Sevastian is not done by a long shot. "But I also won't dishonor them, by becoming a miserable shell of my former self. Martinia wouldn't want that. And Liam wouldn't either!"

"This is my decision to make." It's more than a tad stubborn, but even as I acknowledge it as fact, I am digging my heels.

"Oh aye." Sevastian lets out a long suffering sound. "That it is. But it won't stop me from hoping you go against it, and learn to live happy."

"My vengeance..."

"Will leave you empty once it's over and done." Sevastian insists. "If you don't find something to fill it's void..."

"Fill it? With what? With Who? The princess?" I snort. "Don't be absurd."

"Why is it absurd?" He asks. "She's already rekindled to life a lone spark inside you."

"She's also HIS daughter for one thing. The man I am intent on ruining."

"So? Anyone good who learns of the depth of Maurice depravity, will surely turn against him. Even his own flesh and blood…."

"You're assuming she'd want to believe..." I counter. "And that I'd tell her."

"Why wouldn't you? Why haven't you already?" He demands. "Killian….."

"It won't do any good." I say. "It won't change the fact that I am destroying her home land, driving it's people into a war they won't be able to win. She won't be able to look past that, won't be able to forgive me no matter how awful and evil her father and his court of accomplices truly are!"

He opened and closed his mouth on a wordless sound of frustration, but Sevastian couldn't refute what I was saying. If the princess was as good and pure hearted as I believed her to be, then there was no way she could forgive me. No way she could look past the things I have done, the many crimes I commit, the sins I continue to accumulate.

"There's no chance for a future there.." I mutter it, and continue down the hall's path. "No chance of a happily ever after for us. There NEVER was."

To Be Continued…

I don't really like this chapter, and I think it shows how much I struggled with it. Sorry to go so long between updates. The night I finished the last chapter, ten, I barely finished it, before I got a phone call that added a lot of stress and craziness to my life. Seriously. I was having bad anxiety for about two weeks, complete with panic attacks...was in no condition to write, and once that stress calmed down and started to go away, I found it really hard to get back into writing. I'm still finding it hard to. I'm not sure if I am gonna tinker with this chapter some more….right now I think it's finished. I am hating on it SO much. I feel like this is the best I am capable of, and I hate that it sucks….

I may go update something else. Been thinking about some of my other Hook Belle fics that I need to update. (Like Broken Hearted Comfort!) It just makes it hard to continue when I hate on a chapter as much as I am hating on this one. The weird thing is, when I come back after a while, I probably won't remember WHY I hated on this chapter so much….

As for the fic, so...been dropping the hints for a while now. Has anyone caught on to the fact Killian was literally buried alive? That's why he keeps talking about he died. My head cannon for this fic is Maurice tortured Killian for Neverland, and when Killian wouldn't break and tell him what he wanted to know, Maurice had him buried alive...but luckily Sevastian and Smee came to Killian's rescue and dug him up in time…

I'm also frustrated, cause I thought I would have this chapter be advanced to a different kind of ending. But really I got to the point I just wanted this chapter over with. But originally I had wanted Killian to go to the deck, do some stuff that would time advance the story, to him returning to the cabin. Guess I will try to aim it to happen for the NEXT chapter.

Sorry to be such a downer in the author's note section. I feel like my mood got defeated by this chapter! ^^;; In other news, my left hand, the fingers are having a neuropathy reaction. It's so weird...it comes and goes. It lasts for a few weeks, or few months at a time, but it's so surreal to try and type this with numb fingers on one hand. Luckily it's not all five fingers. Only two. But it's still very weird, and I hope it goes away soon. I always fear the day this numbness in my fingers will be permanent like it is in my toes…

-Michelle

Guest, Thanks. :) I'm pretty fond of Dark Hook too. Dark, tortured feels Hook is so delish! As for Belle, well it is rape so far, so she is right to be upset. Even if she bodily ends up feeling pleasure, she is still hurt by his actions. We'll see how it eventually shapes up. _

Jennie, hi! Nice to meet you, and thank you for such a wonderful review! Ah Voltron….someday I hope to get back to it, but who knows when that will be. I have a lot of note files for my various stories, not just Voltron, but for Once and VP. And my note files tend to get HUGE. I think my brain is too ambitious to be honest with a lot of these ideas. They're all meant to be so long….

At least this time I have my note files backed up a million times in several discs and flashdrives. Back in like 2009, I had a bad computer crash and not only lost my note files for a few of my fics (So I am clueless on what I intended to do with those) but I lost five work in progress chapters, and a completed VP chapter that I had been just about ready to post. I am still kinda upset when I think about the chapters I lost. Really kicking myself for not posting it asap!

Anyway! I'm so glad you decided to give this fic a try, even if it's not your fandom/show. What's more, I tickled pink that you seemed to enjoy it so much! Yay! And also much appreciated is the well wishes, and the lack of pressure. Pressure just kinda has the opposite effect on me, where it stresses me out, and makes me not want to write... _

Guest, thank you! :)