Marana's Piece of Eight

Marana's Piece of Eight

Author's Note: I am trying to make this my longest chapter in the story, just to let you know.

The following morning, when the Pearl arrived at Shipwreck Cove, Jack and Marana were still refusing to speak to each other. Jack tried to put it off his mind. Marana kept as far away from him as possible, until she confronted him later that day, as they were about to proceed forth into the Cove.

"Jack, I'm not going with you." She stated firmly. He narrowed his eyes and glared at her.

"Fine," he said. "Suit yourself. But it'll be your fault when we fail in freeing Calypso, and Beckett's armada destroys us."

She just glared back and said nothing. She went down to the brig, where Tia Dalma was being kept.

She approached the gypsy's cell. "Tia Dalma?" she called softly.

The gypsy sat up on the little bench in the cell and frowned. "Marana, child, why aren't you with Jack?"

Marana replied confidently, "We're fighting right now, so I've refused to go with him to the meeting of the Court."

Tia Dalma looked shocked. "Marana, you must go with them. They are all counting on you."

Marana shook her head. "I am not going. I don't care if Jack is counting on me. He doesn't deserve my help right now. He's nothing but a selfish jerk."

Tia Dalma reached through the bars and took Marana's hand. "But you still love him," she said.

Marana lowered her head. "Yes, I still do. I always will."

"Then go to him, child."

Marana agreed after a long pause. She started to leave, but the gypsy grabbed her hand.

"Take this," Tia Dalma pressed something into her hand.

Marana asked, "What's this for?"

"You'll find out soon enough."

With that, Marana left the cabin, changed clothes, and went out on deck. She sprinted down the gangplank and down to the end of the dock. She tilted her head back and looked at the city. Shipwreck was a city made of thousands and thousands of broken ships, all piled together into a shapeless mound, with various turrets and towers and docks. She heard shouting and screaming and yelling coming from the topmost turret and assumed that that must be where the Court was meeting. She looked at the locket Tia Dalma had given her. It was silver, and shaped like a heart. A long and delicate vine ran along the front, and in the center were the letters MLL. They were Marana's initials. Marana opened it, and saw an engraving of Jack inside the locket.

Quickly, she clipped the chain around her neck and took off running.

She ran as fast as she could, through streets and alleys and passages, past ships and people and garbage, until she got to the top of the city. She peered into the open-air meeting hall of the Court and gasped. Everyone was fighting. There were people climbing on the large table that everyone was gathered around and crashing bottles over one another's heads. In the shouting, clamoring crowd, she located Jack.

Jack looked surprised, but he took it her new outfit with a broad smile.

Marana wore feminine but true pirate garb. She was dressed in a peasant-sleeved maroon shirt, skinny brown pants, tight knee-high black boots laced over her pants, and a tight and form-fitting black leather vest. The vest was shaped over the neckline of the shirt perfectly. She also wore a bandana in her hair, but she didn't wear it like Jack's. It was navy blue, and it was folded into a headband, keeping her dark brown locks several inches behind her head.

Jack just stared at her.

Marana put her hand up before he spoke. "I have not forgiven you, Jack, but Tia Dalma convinced me to come here."

"This is madness," she heard Elizabeth remark from where she stood beside Jack.

"This is politics," Jack replied.

"And meanwhile our enemies are bearing down upon us," Elizabeth pointed out.

"If they not be here already…" Barbossa added with an eye roll.

While everyone was fighting, Marana pulled Jack away from the crowd to talk to him.

"Jack, I'm so sorry," she looked deeply into his eyes when she said this. She reached out and touched his face gently.

"What do you have to be sorry for, Marana?" he asked without making eye contact.

She held his face so that he had to look into her eyes. "Jack, I'm just sorry for yelling at you. Usually I can handle problems without my temper rising. Please forgive me, Jack."

When he saw no trace of a tear in her eyes, he pulled her to him and gave her a gentle hug. "Apology accepted, darling," he whispered in her ear. Then took her face in his hands and kissed her forehead.

Marana saw Barbossa climbing onto the table, so she pulled Jack back into the group.

Barbossa fired his pistol into the ceiling of the ship. "It was the First Court what imprisoned Calypso…we should be the ones to set her free! And in her gratitude, she will see fit to grant us boons!"

"Whose boons? Your boons?" Jack asked from where he stood next to Marana. As Barbossa stepped down from the table, he stated, "Utterly deceptive twaddle-speak, says I."

Barbossa glared at him. "If you have a better alternative…please…share."

"Cuttlefish…eh?" Jack began to walk through the group of pirates that stood along the left side of the table. "Let us not…dear friends…forget our dear friends, the cuttlefish…flipping glorious little sausages. Pin them up together and they will devour each other without a second thought…human nature, isn't it…or, or…fish nature. So, yes, we could hole up well-provisioned and well-armed and half of us would be dead within the month, which seems quite grim to me any way you slice it…or, as my learn-ed colleague so naively suggests…we can release Calypso, and we can pray that she will be merciful. I rather doubt it? Can we in fact pretend that she is anything less than a woman scorned like which fury Hell hath no? We cannot…res ipsa loquitar tabula in naufragio…we are left with but one option…I agree with, and I cannot believe the words are coming out of me mouth…Captain Swann! We must fight!" Jack was on the opposite end of the table

Elizabeth was smirking down at Jack from where she stood between Barbossa and Gibbs.

"You've always run away from a fight!" Barbossa declared.

"Have not!" Jack retorted.

"You have so!"

"Have not!"

"You have so!"

"Have not!"

"You have so, and you know it!" Barbossa finished.

"Have not, slander and calumny," Jack finished confidently. "I have only ever embraced that oldest and noblest of pirate traditions. I submit that here now that is what we all must do: we must fight…to run away!"

"Aye!" Gibbs shouted.

"Aye!" everyone else agreed.

Barbossa crossed his arms over his chest and smirked. "As per the Code, an act of war, and this be exactly that, can only be declared by the Pirate King."

"You made that up!" Jack accused. Marana was pushing her way through the crowd to get to him.

"Did I now?" Barbossa asked innocently. "I call on Captain Teague, Keeper of the Code!"

Marana and Jack both froze at his last statement.

Sri Sumbajee elbowed his interpreter, who said, "Sri Sumbajee proclaims this all to be folly!" He smacked his hand down on the table. "Eh, hang the Code! Who cares a-"

All of a sudden, a bullet flashed through the air and pierced the interpreter in the chest. He fell back onto the ground.

Marana looked up at a staircase that was on the back wall of the ship. She saw a tall pirate standing at the top, faintly lit by lantern light, and holding a smoking pistol.

Captain Teague blew away the smoke. "The Code is the law." he declared as he began to descend down the stairs.

Marana got to Jack and clasped his hand. Teague came up behind them. "You're in my way, boy," he said to Jack. Marana pulled him to the side a little. Then Teague motioned for the two elderly pirates carrying the Code book to come forward.

They came slowly, carrying the heavy book between them, which they set down on the table. Teague whistled, and a dog came forward, carrying a key ring between its teeth.

Teague took the ring, and was about to unlock the book when he spotted Marana.

"Miss Lark…step forward," he said in his deep voice. Marana stepped cautiously up to the book.

Teague took her right hand by the wrist and placed her palm over the words Pirata Codex on the heavy wooden cover of the book. Marana closed her eyes as she felt the book heat under her hand. A strange red glow came from the letters, and it reflected on her face. Then her locket began to throb. It glowed in the same red color until Marana's hand was jerked back, and she fell back into Jack's arms. Then Teague unlocked the book and opened it to a bookmarked page.

The page was made of a very thick parchment, and it was covered in fancy calligraphy. Teague scanned the page carefully, running his finger along the words.

"Ah…Barbossa is right," he stated, pointing to one sentence.

Jack stepped in front of him. "Hang on a minute…" he looked back over the sentence that Teague had indicated. "It shall be the duties of the King to declare war…parley with shared adversaries…fancy that."

"There had not been a King since the First Court, and that's not likely to change," said Capitaine Chevalle, a French pirate who wore a lot of makeup and fancy clothes.

"Not likely," Teague echoed as he stepped back and sat down on a chair in the back of the hall.

"Why not?" Elizabeth asked.

"See, the Pirate King is elected by popular vote-" Gibbs started.

"-and each pirate only ever votes for hisself," Barbossa finished.

"I call for a vote!" Jack declared.

Everyone rolled their eyes as Teague started playing Spanish Ladies on an acoustic guitar.

"I vote for Ammand the Corsair," a tall Arabian pirate in red and brown cotton robes with a huge moustache and a turban said as he stood up.

"Capitaine Chevalle, the penniless Frenchmen," the French pirate said with great dignity.

"Sri Sumbajee votes for Sri Sumbajee," said Sumbajee's other interpreter.

"Mistress Ching!" shouted an elderly-ish Chinese pirate with frown lines.

"Gentleman Jocard!" said a tall black pirate in tribal robes.

"Elizabeth Swann," Elizabeth sighed.

"Barbossa," Barbossa said with great dignity.

"Villanueva!" shouted a bad-tempered, elderly-ish Spanish pirate.

"Marana Lark," Marana sighed.

Jack had to think awhile before deciding, "Elizabeth Swann."

"What?" Elizabeth and Marana said at the same time.

"I know, curious, isn't it?" he smirked. At once, everyone started yelling and arguing and screaming. Then Jack said, "Am I to understand that you will not be keeping to the Code, then?"

At that moment, Teague broke a string on his guitar and glared fiercely at everyone. Everyone slowly sat back down. Mistress Ching gestured at Elizabeth. "Very well…what say you, Captain Swann, King of the Brethren Court?"

"Prepare every vessel that floats," she said confidently. "At dawn, we're at war."

Then Sumbajee stood up. His beard almost covered his whole chest. "And so…we shall go to war!" He said in a very high-pitched voice. At once, everyone started shouting again. Then Jack, grabbing Marana's hand, turned around and locked eyes with his father.

"What?" he asked after seeing Teague's hard glare. "You've seen it all, done it all…you survived. That's the trick, isn't it…to survive?"

Teague stroked the guitar gently and replied, "It's not just about living forever, Jackie." he stood up and approached his son. "The trick is…living with yourself…forever."

Jack nodded. "How's Mum?" he asked, gripping Marana's hand even tighter.

With a stone cold glare on his face, Teague held up a decaying shrunken head. Jack took it with a revolted look etched across his face.

"She looks great," he commented. Then he pulled Marana over near one of the windows.

"Marana…" he began in a whisper.

Marana touched the locket on her neck.

"What's that?" he asked, reaching out to touch it.

Marana opened it and showed him the engraving. "It's my Piece of Eight," she replied.

All Jack could do was smile.