Author's note: This chapter is also dark... things are going to start happening, mates, I promise. Pirate Cat

۞

All eyes were upon Jack as the story had progressed ... Janie kept squeezing his hand as she spoke of her accord with Captain Teague, and all were silent when Janie paused for a sip of hot tea. The peat logs in the fireplace crackled and popped, breaking the quietness.

"... Jack... your father loves you, and you know it," William spoke up, as Jack's gaze had dropped to both of his hands, now holding Janie's as if he thought that she would take her hand away from him. Jack wanted to say something, but only opened his mouth and closed it again. His head tilted back and he looked at his young cousin, as William gently continued.

'... he saluted you as we were victorious in the Battle of the Maelstrom. And when my father contacted him in Madagascar to seek his aid in helping you and I parlay with Hector Barbossa to trade the Calypso's Hand for the Black Pearl, Captain Teague never hesitated once. He came to your side right away, bringing the Pirata Codex with him! He is proud of you, mate... he cares about you...

"I know that he does," Jack nodded, his slender fingers gently massaging the back of Janie's hand absently. "... I know that he does... he's just... I'm just..." he stammered.

"Stubborn." Janie said firmly. "... ye may look just like Maggie, ye may be talkative just like Maggie, and ye may be daft just like Maggie, but you inherited Teague's stubbornness."

"Did not!"

"Did, too."

"Did not!"

"Did, too."

"Whose side are ye on, Janie?" Jack turned to look at her.

"Teague's." was the answer, with narrowed blue eyes glaring at him.

The captain looked at the snickering Turners, and his lower lip began to pout. "Oh."

Janie patted his hands, then said, softly, "I did not hear from Captain Teague for three months... and I nearly gave up ever seeing my Jackie alive again..."

Jack's eyes returned to staring into the crackling fire in the fireplace, as William and Elizabeth listened raptly... they soon noticed that Jack had squeezed his eyes shut... Janie kept patting his hand, gently, as the story continued...

۞

... Captain Teague had stealthily been following a ship called the Queen of the Dark, a privateer vessel that had taken on shipboard slaves during the November that had changed young Janie's life. He had not only broken into the slave auction office with his first mate in the darkness of night, and had looked at the records, they had stolen the entire ledger with the names of those unfortunates that had been sold, and the ships that they had been taken to at the harbour. The captain's first mate, Joshamee Gibbs, Senior, watched his captain's face with apprehension when he saw one entry.

"Name: Jack

Gender: Male

Age upon date of sale: Approximately 6 years

Race: Gypsy/coloured. Black curly hair, brown eyes.

Notes: bastard; no legal guardian. Very slight of build, small for age. Suited only for shipboard labour. Does not speak English, only Irish Gaelic.

Final sale price: Three pounds, tenpence.

Purchased by: Jonas Culpepper, captain of privateer galleon 'Queen of the Dark'."

Teague angrily slammed the ledger closed, and with a nod of his head to his first mate, they immediately left in the embrace of the darkness... toward the taverns in the seamier side of town... it was here that they would begin to ask a long trail of questions... paying for information if it was necessary... using force, if need be.

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The Queen of the Dark was moored off of the coast of Morocco... and the crew was lined up at gunpoint upon the main deck. The stench aboard the Queen was almost unbearable... they were getting ready to clean the hold of its cargo, and take on new cargo upon the west coast of Africa, south of their location. They'd had a fairly successful run to deliver a fresh shipment of African captives to Spain, but there had been some that had died of dysentery that were still below... their bodies had not been pitched overboard yet, and the smell of death was nearly overwhelming in the heat.

The only slaves that were present were those that were chained to iron rings that were fastened to the deckboards... they were a motley crew, filthy and thin, in various states of health... they looked up in hope for a moment, but in seeing that the other ship was a pirate vessel, the hope faded and they simply watched with hollow eyes.

The captain of the vessel was being held in his cabin with the barrel of a pistol pushed to his head by the dark, menacing pirate that was the captain of the ship that had seemingly had materialized out of nowhere, her cannons pointing straight at her, broadside. The pirate crew outnumbered the crew of the privateer ship, and it was only after a short trade of gunfire that the pirate crew was able to board, swords and guns flashing.

Captain Culpepper was able to throw a wig over his bald pate and cram a hat over that, when the captain of the Star of Madagascar lumbered across the gangplank... the very picture of the devil himself, his black eyes flashing and his pistol drawn. His long braids swung with his swaying walk, and his face was a picture of ice cold fury.

His only words to the indignant slavemaster were, "... where is Jack?"

"I have no idea who you are talking about!" was the belligerant reply, as the cruel Culpepper adjusted the wig and hat upon his head. "There is no one named 'Jack' on this ship. There was a whelp slave on board once, but he died and I threw his bloody body to the sharks."

Teague leaned into the man's face so as to almost bend him completely backwards, and said, in a low, hard growl, "... where is JACK?"

His eyes popping from his head, the captain could only now stare in stupified fear, his hand holding his hat onto his head so hard that it scrunched his wig down over his eyebrows. His mouth worked but no words escaped, as Teague put his pistol between Culpepper's eyes and cocked it.

Culpepper gulped hard, and then finally croaked, "In the hold... he has dysentery... he's dying..."

۞

They almost gagged as they descended into the hold, Culpepper with the keys to the shackles jangling in his shaking hands, being roughly shoved down the steps by Teague and his first mate. The darkness was only pierced by the light from the opening... and it was enough to see the grisly swelling bodies of those who had succumbed to the heat and dysentery that had been brought aboard by a sailor on shore leave... there were only 10 bodies chained together, waiting for a mass burial at sea, but they had rotted quickly and were barely recognizable as human beings.

Teague looked about quickly... it had been 6 weeks since they had left Ireland with valuable information that they ended up gathering in Dublin, his home city, and the informants were reliable old friends. They required only minimal payment once they found out that Teague was looking for his child.

Casting his black eyes around while holding his pistol to the terrified Culpepper's face, Teague finally spotted something that made his hardened heart jump. In the darkness, a pair of eyes stared at him... brown, sick eyes... a pair of eyes, just like Maggie's.

Ordering his first mate to take the pistol, Teague knelt down in the stinking darkness toward the frightened, fever bright eyes that looked straight into his... and there was a flicker of recognition, and Teague had to try with all of his might to keep tears from his eyes...

"... Papa...?"

Reaching out his hand ever so slowly, Teague whispered, "... Jackie...?"

The brown eyes filled with tears.

۞

The crew of the Star of Madagascar cheered as her cannons blew the Queen of the Dark into oblivion. The crew of the slaveship was set adrift in their longboat, and the shipboard slaves were brought aboard the Star to be taken to the next pirate friendly port, and set free. The Star's pirate captain did not watch the sinking of the Queen, as he was trying to comfort the screaming child that was in his cabin... the firing of the cannons had scared him out of his wits, and with good reason...

He was nothing but skin and bones... his ribs were protruding, and it was evident that some had been broken at one time... his skin was ashen, and he was wracked with dysentery and a case of scurvy. He was caked with his own waste, and had some scars that a frail nine year old boy should not have. His small right ankle was raw and calloused from having an iron ring around it more than likely since he was brought aboard the ship, and his slender, long hands and his knees were red and rough from endlessly swabbing deck boards .

The thing that made Teague nearly sick with absolute fury was two rotting teeth in his boy's lower jaw, and the child's hair... what was not falling out from malnutrition was grown out past his shoulders, over his face, matted and ridden with lice. He would have to shave his son's thick, black hair right down to his very skin... There was no excuse for any of this complete indignity...

As he finally was able to quiet his child's crying, he ordered that a bucket of warm water and towels be brought into his cabin, as well as a razor for his hair, and some warm broth. And as he gently bathed his silent nine year old son, he thought, "... my little bird... my little bird... I found him, Janie... and I am bringing him home to Eire...'

'...I cannot stay... he is just like his mother and I know that once he has the chance, he will run away and break my heart, again... but I am bringing him home, for now... I will care for him as best as I can, now, and in the future, but from a distance... I will keep in touch with you, Janie ... and I will hold up my end of our accord... your father will pay for this... he will pay for what he did to my son, to the woman that I would have married, and to you...he will pay, but we will wait for the opportune moment..."

And Edward Jonathan Teague remorselessly thought of the one who had paid first. Captain Culpepper had demanded to know this pirate captain's name as he was unlocking the slave boy's shackles... as he stood up, Teague's cold reply was, "Where you are going, it won't matter what my name is..."

And with a Gaelic oath of damnation, he had calmly pulled the trigger and blew his son's tormentor's brains out...

To be continued...