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Chapter 23

The weather was erratic today. At one time with winds that were steady and strong, and the next, a few intermittent gusts followed by a sudden drop to a near calm. Not the best weather for a sailing ship. The Black Pearl felt as though she limped along in halting lunges, rather than driving purposefully before the wind.

Capricious, Jack thought, and screwed up his eyes against another sudden gust. Aye, that's a good wording for it - capricious.

Rather a fair description also of his present companion. She had shown up on deck, arms laden with a pile of his own clothing. He'd wondered where those articles had vanished to. The rust colored shirt that hung around him now was far too large, and far too old. Good thing for him that he hadn't thrown it away just yet - it was the only shirt he had left that didn't look and smell like the fourth morning of a three day shore leave.

"Here," the Lady had said, shoving the pile into his hands. "I'm hoping that's the last time I'll feel the need to sew these or you back together again."

That had stung a bit. "A simple 'please try to be more careful when saving my life, Jack' would have sufficed." he muttered sulkily, and she lowered her eyes contritely.

"S' alright, luv. No worries." He pulled his coat on, and noted her own choice of apparel. "I'm taking it that there's more to this visit than just returning my old rags.

"

"Yes," Miranda began cautiously, "I've remembered again."

And so it was that Jack found himself once again seated atop the uppermost platform of the mizenmast with this woman whose temperament was as unpredictable to him as this weather. Listening while the words poured out of her.

"Let me back you up there a bit." he said when she'd finished, "What's this about an 'immortal in the honored place'?"

"I don't know." Miranda admitted with a quick shake of her head. "Mama wanted to explain it to me. All of it, I'm sure, but..."

"Why didn't she?" Perhaps if he kept her talking, more useful hints would jar loose.

"She never had a chance." The Lady turned her face away, staring fixedly at the horizon line off their stern. "She - when I left my husband... ran home, I wasn't very..." She cleared her throat and pressed on, looking pained. "It wasn't pleasant to see."

Jack felt a hot swoop of anger. Her words more or less proved his assessment of the nobleman's character. He wasn't usually the kind to contemplate doing away with someone who hadn't personally wronged him, but in the case of this Dunnthorpe fellow, an exception was definitely in order.

"She had a stroke." Miranda's voice cracked in earnest this time. "Not long after I came home. She went to bed, and sometime in the night... Papa said that he didn't blame me for it - that her health hadn't been good that year. I guess... I guess seeing me like that must have been too much for her."

She fell silent again. Jack felt he knew her well enough to recognize that she was trying to pull herself together. When she spoke again, it was in a quick, clipped monotone. As if saying it this way could keep her from feeling the effect of her own words.

"She was paralyzed... she never could move or speak after that. And the winter was bad that year. Worse than any I remember. It seemed as though spring would never come again. Mama caught an illness in her lungs.

"The doctors..." Miranda paused, and Jack almost flinched at the anger with which she uttered that word, "The doctors did everything they could think of to her. As though bleeding a body already weakened by a stroke could somehow strengthen it. She didn't last the year.

The Lady brushed at her reddened eyes. "Mama never had the chance to tell me any of it - what I had to be strong for, what it was that had been sundered, and why it had to stay that way. Or even why it mattered so much that I knew there was a stone hidden in that ring, and Elisse didn't.

"And papa had no knowledge of any of it." she went on with frustration in her voice, perhaps anticipating that Jack was about to ask this very thing. "Only that she'd asked him shortly before I was married to make certain that I was the one to inherit it."

"What about this sister of yours then," he asked, "If that ring was supposed to go to her first, maybe she knew more?"

The Lady sighed wearily. "Elisse is the eldest." she said as if this explained things. "And as such, she was mostly concerned about her status. It meant far more to her to be the firstborn daughter of a Count, really. I think the only reason why she felt slighted when I took possession of it was that the tradition was broken. She confided in me before that she always thought it was a vulgar, clumsy thing from another age. She swore she'd never actually wear it."

Miranda narrowed her eyes, averted her face from another gust of the feckless winds. "I'm certain that she didn't know any more than I do. Less, in fact, than I know."

She drew her knees up under her chin, wrapping her arms around her legs. Effectively closing herself off from him.

Jack left her to her thoughts for a time while he leaned back against the spar, joining up what she'd told him today with what he'd learned from her earlier recollections.

Any way he slanted it, the resulting picture didn't look very encouraging. For all intents and purposes, what he'd overheard while eavesdropping on Dunnthorpe and his odd-voiced friend had sounded nothing more mysterious than a greedy pair on a treasure hunt. Not so terribly different than seeking out the location of an 'island that cannot be found except by those who already know where it is'.

But like the reality of the curse attached to Cortez's gold, all of these signs were pointing towards something very unpleasant looming just out of view. At this very moment he found himself regretting ever having put in to Jamaica. Ever having involved himself and his ship with this woman and her ominous plight in the first place. If something of world ending proportions was about to descend upon them, Jack would have sorely preferred to be ignorant of it.

Or, at the very least, to know that he'd be spending his last moments with a bouncy wench and a bottle of his favorite.

"I don't know that I've ever remembered to thank you," said Miranda, shaking him from these dark musings. She was looking shyly at him. "For trying to help me, that is. You didn't need to endanger yourself."

Ah well... so much for self recriminations. "When this is all over, you'll have to have a talk with Elizabeth about that." He sighed, then went on in tones of affected nobility. "I just can't seem to turn my back on a fair lady in distress."

She smiled wanly. "You're presuming, of course, that I'll emerge from this alive."

"Well of course you will. I'm surprised to find your Ladyship ever doubting it."

Her eyes had that glassy look of someone trying to keep tears at bay.

"How can you be so certain? My loving husband on the one side looking for some idea of a hidden fortune, this creature that can command the winds apparently wide awake, and looking for Heaven only knows what on the other..." She trailed off, shaking her head in dismay.

"Ah, but you forget one very important thing, luv." He grinned, and nodded knowingly, "You've got Captain Jack Sparrow at your back now... how can we lose?"

Lord... did he just say 'we'?

Oh no. This wasn't good. Now the Lady was crying, and he hated to see a woman cry. Never sure of what to do when the weeping started. But wait - she was crying... and shaking with silent laughter at the same time. Truly, as long as he lived, he would never understand these creatures!

"Come here, girl," he heard himself say, and held out his arms to her. "Just two old friends up here on this mast, and you look to be needing a shoulder right now. Come on," he coaxed when she only stared at him, "Nothin' more than that - that is, if you'll be willing to take the word of a black-hearted, lecherous pirate, of course." He widened his eyes dramatically, and waggled his head.

She hiccoughed out a nervous laugh, then scooted herself across to his other side, and leaned into his uninjured shoulder. "No," she said in a watery little voice. "But I will accept the word of Captain Jack Sparrow."

"That settles it, then," He draped his arm around her, and felt the tense set of her shoulders relax just a bit. "As long as I can trust her Ladyship to not be overwhelmed by my charmin' ways and try to take advantage of me poor, kindly self."

Miranda lifted her head, regarding him flatly. "I do believe I still have some dried peas somewhere on my person, sir."

Jack raised his hands in surrender. "Peace, Lady. I've every confidence in your honorable intentions - Ooof!"

She had jabbed her elbow into his side. Not with any great force, really, but just enough to let him know she'd retaliated. He took it in good natured stride, giving a brief squeeze to her shoulders.

How easy it was to forget everything when perched up here. No real pressing sense of time. No need to fill the silences with needless talk. Jack didn't have a clue as to how long they sat there, while the wind rose and fell around them in its unpredictable fashion, and the clouds moved slowly overhead. Only that his companion seemed to be far more at ease now with himself, and the world in general.

But then, trips aloft usually had the same effect on himself.

"May I ask you something?" she said after what must have been a long silence.

"I'm hardly of a mind to stop you, darlin'." Jack returned, and frowned as their sputtering breeze died again to a near calm. She sat up and faced him.

"This ship. The Black Pearl... she's not like other ships, is she?"

He met her eyes, brows raising. "What makes you say that?"

No one single thing, I suppose." Miranda shrugged. "I can't claim to know all there is about ship building, but... this isn't a 'young' vessel. She's built like - like something out of the last century. Only she runs as though she's narrower in the keel than a ship of this kind should be." Miranda looked confused. "I've been below. This hull was made for a fighting ship - the ribs are too large, too closely spaced to be for anything but combat, and yet..." She co,cked her head, and gestured at the air around her. "This is a heavy ship, and a large one as well. How is she able to move this fast?

"And since she is this fast," The questions were pouring out of her now, "Whose idea was it for the oars? I'd wondered what those smaller ports were for when I saw them, and -"

"Hold on!" he laughed, waving his hands to stop this sudden flood, "Slow down, slow down - you could drown a man in all these questions."

Jack settled against the spar, and stretched his legs out before him, considering what to tell her. In the end, he decided on the most unlikely of explanations.

He told her the truth.

"To be perfectly honest with you, luv, I've no idea."

She seemed disappointed, but still gave her attention.

"Always been this way though. Least wise, as long as I've know of the Pearl. Even when she was stolen from me, and 'Captain' Barbossa let her go all to hell, she was still the fastest under sail."

"And the most dreaded." Miranda informed. "Even the faintest glimpse of a black sail on the horizon was enough to send most running."

Oh, yes. Something that he still found himself confronted with from time to time. Hector Barbossa had cut a bloody swath throughout this region in his day. Far too many ships sent to the bottom with all hands locked below. Far too many towns and settlements hazed to the ground with appallingly few survivors to tell the tale.

What a waste. What a bloody, stupid waste.

But thankfully his ship was not the only one clothed in black. And now that the sails no longer resembled tattered grave clothes, as they had when his mutinous crew had scoured the Caribbean in search of an end to their curse, it was becoming easier to blend in as any other ship again.

"You know, for a while there," he admitted, "I had her dressed in white canvas on her Mainmast and Sprit. Never felt quite right, though. The Pearl's meant to be black, same as the day I first saw her."

"Love at first sight again?" his companion asked wryly, no doubt remembering the yarn he'd spun about his ill-fated Lily-Rose. Jack grinned back.

"Oh, far worse, Lady. Far worse. Haven't recovered yet."

But then, looking into her amused eyes, Jack once again found himself compelled to give the most unlikely of answers.

"Actually, if it's the truth you're wanting... first time I laid eyes on the Black Pearl, it was a terrible disappointment."

Her brows shot upward, and he shrugged in response. "Seems funny now, but I was a young fire brand back then. Eager to get another command after I'd lost my first ship, and I'd been a couple of years with Captain Joseph Davvick.

Old 'Lack-Ear', they called him. Got himself in a skirmish with the King's Navy, and lost an ear to a hail of grape shot. Norrington caught up with him about eight years ago back in the Commodore's lowly captaining days, but long before that, I'd served as old Davvick's First Mate.

"Well, I was spoiling for my own ship again, and Lack-Ear begins to worry I might just be elected leader in his place, so he offers me my own command.

"'Jacky, my lad', he says to me," Jack deepened his voice into a rusty, growling imitation of his former Captain, "'Ye got the look of a boy just beggin' to prove hisself. Well, I gots me just the vessel fer ye ta test yer mettle - long as ye don' get this one broadsided same as the last. Feast yer eyes, me boy. Feast yer eyes.'

"And so, I feasted my eyes."

"The Black Pearl?" Miranda curled her legs under her and waited for him to go on.

"Aye, lass. The Black Pearl - and a sorry sight I thought she looked, too. Listing there off the coast of Madagascar, a great, ruddy hole in her bow. Her sprit beam was hanging by a splinter, with all that black canvas half-furled like nobody gave a damn, and hanging there limp in the heat of the day. Thought to myself: What's old Lack-Ear playing at - trying to pawn off this old, broken down derelict on me? Probably so rotted through below the waterline that a good sneeze would capsize it."

He shook his head, marveling ironically at the memory. "And there's all my mates. Standing around laughing and pointing, telling me I'll be limping along behind the rest of our cohort, picking up whatever scraps were left floating. I wanted to pitch old Davvick right over the side then and there.

"So the next day, I took a little swim. Decided if the hull was in as bad a state as I'd figured, I'd tell my good Captain just what I thought of his offer, and find myself a better man to sail under.

"And do you know what I found?" he asked, dropping his voice to a near whisper, leaning closer to the Lady.

"No." Miranda's tone was equally hushed, her wide eyes fixed on his face.

"Found myself a hull smooth as a baby's bum. Clean as the day she was launched, I'd wager, and not a barnacle or wormhole to be found. I near about drowned myself that day trying to find some damage, or signs of repair, but..." He spread his hands, affecting a baffled expression. "Nothing. Except for that hole someone saw fit to put through the bow, there was nothing wrong with her. So, I climbed on board to see the rest of this mess I was going to find myself loaded with, and... that was it."

Miranda narrowed her eyes. "It?" she repeated carefully.

"It," Jack repeated with a nod. "Standing on that deck was like something... something out of a dream. A fever dream, if you like. I just... knew that this was where I was supposed to be. Even at a standstill there off Madagascar."

Jack closed his eyes, tipping his head back with a smile as the wind returned, steadily increasing.

"But the first time I took the wheel... ah, lass - how can I even describe it to you?"

Indeed, what words could convey it? The feeling was as clear now as it had been that first day, when this ship had seemed to come to life in the wheel in his hands, in the very deck beneath his feet, and he couldn't escape the idea that this strange, dark ship had somehow been waiting just for him. The world was suddenly a place of infinite promise on that day. Nothing was out of reach. Nothing was impossible.

"Was it like flying?" Miranda's voice came to him now. Soft above the sound of the sails.

"Flying?" Jack met her serious eyes, and remembered another day not that long ago spent on this very platform. There had been no mockery in her on that day, and should he speak his mind now, there would still be none.

Still... he couldn't bring himself to say it aloud. It was too dear a part of him. Not something to be displayed for the world to see. Too many years of mistrust. To fresh, even now, that sense of betrayal. He didn't lie to her... not really.

He just didn't tell her everything.

"Aye, lass. It's about as close to flying as an old tar like me is ever going to get." He looped his arm around her shoulders, and drew her back to his side again.

Easier to keep that part of himself locked away if he couldn't see those eyes of hers.

"And that's how I got the Pearl. Don't even know where she came from, or what she was called before. Just that soon enough, Davvick and the rest of his band got sick of me getting to the prizes before they could even pull along, and, er... encouraged me to strike out on my own. Which was fine by me - if I'd wanted to spend the rest of my days risking life and limb so that old Lack-Ear's purse could get bigger, I'd have stayed in the merchant fleet, or joined the Navy.

"So, we parted from Davvick's company. Just me, a few mates who wanted to stay on, and..." He patted his hand fondly on the wood of the platform. "My 'Pearl of great price'."

Miranda craned her neck to look up at him. "Is that what your ship is named for?"

"Heard a man telling a story once. A very long time ago it was, about some fellow who sold everything for a 'pearl of great price'. " Jack shrugged. "Guess it sort of stuck in my head."

She laughed softly, an odd expression on her face.

" 'The kingdom of Heaven,' " she began slowly. " 'Is like unto a merchantman seeking goodly pearls: Who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all he had, and bought it.' "

The very one! How had she known...

Miranda shook her head, smiling gently. "It's a parable, Jack. It's from the Bible."

"Ah." Well, that explained why he hadn't recognized the old man's story. Hard enough to make one' s way in this world without the image of a deity who would most certainly disapprove of him getting in the way of things.

"You were right," Miranda said then. "Up here, it does all seem clearer."

Jack smiled to hear his own sentiments shared. "Feel better?"

He heard a long sigh. Then, "When I don't have to think about it? Yes, I suppose I do. It's just..."

She sat up, frowning down at the planks beneath her hand. "It's frustrating to realize that there's something I'm supposed to have the answers to, and it's just not there. Like trying to identify a piece of music, but you're only allowed to hear one note from the third bar, another from two pages forward..."

He nodded in understanding. Then, another thought came to him; maybe he'd been asking her to go about this in the wrong way, wanting her to devote all her energies to recalling these all but forgotten memories. Unless he was very much mistaken, everything that had come to her so far had done so only when her mind was focused elsewhere: during that first meeting in the Great Cabin, at supper later that same night, and by her own admission, while mending in her shared cabin today.

The more he mulled this over, the more Jack was convinced that he was right.

"How's AnaMaria?" he asked out of the blue, surprising her with this sudden shift of topic.

"Her injuries, you mean? Quite well, actually. Better than I'd expected, come to think of it." Miranda brushed strands of hair back from her face. "I had her stitches out yesterday, and aside from some remaining tenderness, she'll be fully recovered in no time.

"But then, she is still quite young. Very strong, too. I've heard that you found this out first hand, as a matter of fact." This last was said with a faint spark of the Lady's mischievous humor.

"That girl's got a wicked right, and a temper to match." Jack remarked with a lopsided grin, seeing again the day he'd encountered his spirited First Mate on the wharfs of Tortuga with Will Turner at his side. "She nearly knocked me on my backside when we met again. Not once, but twice."

"Yes, " Miranda laughed softly. "I'd heard something to that effect." She leaned into his side once more, and her eyes lifted to the skies.

The clouds had drifted in to hide the sun, but it wasn't long before the power of that celestial body rimmed the entire cloud bank with a sharp line of gold. Light punched through, spreading out over ship and water in long, finger-like rays.

"Beautiful," she murmured, and as many times as he's seen this particular phenomenon, Jack had to agree.

"Almost like the hand of God, isn't it?"

Alright, so it was a strange kind of sentiment coming from a man such as himself, but as she'd seen fit to quote the scriptures to him, it was somehow fitting under the circumstances.

At least he thought so, until the small body at his side stiffened with a gasp. Miranda drew away, staring at him as though she'd never seen him before.

"Just something an old shipmate of mine used to call it," he explained, wondering what in the world he could have said to offend her.

"The hand of God," Miranda repeated with a shudder that rocked her. "No - the hand... of the god!"

"Miranda, what -"

But the Lady was already on her feet, tugging at his arm until he rose as well.

"That's it," she exclaimed, suddenly pale. "That's what this is about, Captain. The 'finger of the god' points to the sun temple, remember? But it's pointing to the hand of the god - to itself. To the rest of itself!"

"I'm not following you, darlin'," Jack confessed. She didn't bother to explain, but grabbed hold of the shrouds, plainly meaning to descend.

"Ooh, I hate this part," he distinctly heard her say as she stepped gingerly onto the lines. Then, "Could you... could you please help me down again?"

He shrugged and joined her, doing his level best to hide his amusement at her repeated reminders to herself. The low voiced mantra of "one hand for myself, one for the ship" accompanied him all the way down to the channel planks.

A short time later in the First Mate's cabin, however, Jack wasn't smiling anymore.

A/N: Bring on the drama, Michiru? If you insist. But you should be careful what you ask for...(evil grin)

Blueskiezrusty and Cold-blooded-angel: Thanks very much! Hope this one keeps you both as wrapped up!

Whoop! New blood in Hendercats! Wheee! Thank you very much!

Geekmama... SQUEEEEEE! I'm flattered beyond belief here! Folks, if you haven't read this lady's work, you don't know what you're missing - seriously! I just started through her saga myself, and all I could think was (cries) I'M NOT WORTHY! I'm very exited to find more examples of our minds being in the same gutter at the same time. (inside joke - don't ask, you'll sleep better!)

Wow... this'll make for 22 chapters - although this site thinks it's 26 - and close to 100,000 words... and I've got so much farther to go before I'm done. To be honest, I'm amazed I've made it this far. Thank you all for sticking this out with me, and I'll be back soon with the next installment. Thank you for sailing with Outlaw Jungle Cruises, and please be carful when exiting the boat...

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