Chapter 36 Mind games
They sat on the sand and avoided looking at each other, both silent, neither sure what there was to be said, nor what there was that was wise to say. Somehow they were both certain that the other had seen something important and something similar to their own vision. The mind games played by this place, if that was what they were, appeared to have a set of rules and a worrying degree of consistency. Neither of them wanted to speculate much on why that might be. Though for the moment neither of them was thinking very much at all, for though the vision had passed the feelings it had stirred were less quick to fade.
Elanor couldn't have said how long she had stayed there, held by Jack and lost in the past and her private misery. She thought she might have put her arms around his neck and sobbed at one point, but she wasn't sure, and didn't want to be. Just as she didn't want to be sure that he had allowed it; though she thought that he had sat holding her, gently, and without a word, for some time, with his eyes wide and sad and fixed on another place. She was sure that her face had been pressed to wet linen for a while and that beneath that she had felt blood heat and a heart beat, her relief at the reality of it too great to explain. He was alive then, unlike the subjects of her imagining, and so therefore, in all probability, was she, which might or might not be something to be glad of. In the uncounted time she sat there submerged in her sense of loss there was no feeling of gladness at that survival only a greater sense of guilt, that she lived while they did not.
Elanor wasn't certain that Jack knew that she was there, circled by his arm, for after those desperate words he seemed to retreat, to become lost in his own world again. She thought she had felt a slight but constant tremor in the arms around her shoulders and he might have laid his face against her hair for a moment or two, though she wasn't certain of that either.
But eventually she had turned her face away from the body warm shirt and moved to sit straight. He had drawn a deep breath as she did so and released her immediately, and without comment. They returned from those long ago places then, and had risked a single look at each other, both uncertain, almost ashamed of what the other might have seen, before turning away to stare at the water that was not the sea in silence.
That look had been enough for her to know that his eyes were reddened and strained in the silver blue light and that faint but visible smudges marked his cheekbones. The water droplets glistening on his eyelashes and at the corners of his moustache could have been condensation, or they might have been something else entirely. She hated to think what her own eyes were like; they felt bad enough, hot and swollen, as if her eyelids had been bitten by a thousand gnats.
When he got to his feet, she followed him, pushing her hair behind her and braiding it fiercely. For a moment they stood, side by side, and stared at what they had taken for the sea.
Now it was clear that lake was more the word for it, and then again it was not. Maybe the word was lagoon, or swamp, or inlet, for it was all of these and yet none of them. The boundary of it was uncertain, its shape and size seeming to shift in the hazy light. Though there was an e between the water and the sands that enclosed it that too was unstable, the two merging into one another then separating again as if they were both land and water at the time, as if their differences were only surface deep. The air above it seemed opaque as if it absorbed the little light that there was, the atoms of the air becoming thickened with a wrapping of light, and the surface of the water had an oiled sheen with an almost metallic edge to it. 'Like molten steel' she found herself thinking. It had a silent and secretive air about it too, perhaps in part because it showed no sign of life, unlike the chaos of the world above it. But the water was water, sea or lake, she was sure of that and the colour of it, a clear, but dark, watered green, suggested that it was very deep, whatever else it was.
Looking at it made her uncomfortable, stirring fears of monsters and sudden death that she thought she had conquered long ago. It was so still, no wind rippled the silken surface, no birds wheeled across it, and no fish jumped within it; and yet there was somehow the strong impression that it was not dead. Elanor shivered slightly as she looked at it, something about it suggested that, for all its stillness, it was very alive indeed.
Jack moved a pace or two closer and stood, hand on hips, watching the play of light across the smooth surface. 'It looks cold' he thought, 'despite the heat of the air. Very cold. But alive, almost as if it is watching us.' The thought brought a sudden shiver and send his hand reaching for his pistol butt. Yet there was something that drew him towards it even as his fingers closed over the familiar stock, a pull as insistent but unknowing as the pull of north for a compass needle. He took another step towards it and away from Elanor,
"Strange place for a lake, if that is what it is," he said eventually.
He spoke quietly, almost to himself yet loud enough for her to hear if she wished to listen, but was annoyed to find that, for all his attempt at world weary insouciance, his voice carried a harsher rasp than usual. She didn't reply and in some way he was glad of it, for he found that he was uncomfortable with her presence and resentful of her intrusion into his sorrow; of all things that should have been his alone. Something she might have seen more of than he liked. He wanted to pretend that she wasn't there and yet he couldn't, any more than he could forget the grief of moments before. But it could not be changed, just like the cause of it, and all he could hope was that she had been occupied enough with her own loss. Remembering her flight to the water he felt a little reassured, there was no doubt that she had been as distraught as he might have been, whatever it was that she had seen.
Jack didn't really need to ask to know what that had been.
Elanor watched him silently, almost seeing his thoughts in his frown. The stiffness in his shoulders spoke volumes about his discomfort at her presence, at her seeing what he thought she might have been seeing, and he was obviously uncertain about how to go forward while he felt so exposed. Jack Sparrow was probably unused to people seeing things of him that he didn't want them to see. She knew just how he felt.
Warily he cast a wary glance back at her over his shoulder,
"You'd have though that it would have spilled into the sea when the island sunk. Or did whatever it did to create this place."
He heard her draw a deep breath, and then the whisper of shifting sand as she came closer. When it came her voice was husky but the words followed on from his and in a similar manner, calm and controlled.
"I agree, but then the whole place is strange." There was a slight pause before she resumed, "this blue light is different to the light up there but I can't see why. There is no moon or stars, nor any lamp that I can make out, so why is there light at all? If there is then why is it different down here?"
Jack shook his head,
"Can't help you on that." He gave her another hesitant look, "but it seems as keen on mind games down here as it was up there."
"Yes." She let a long breath out in a hiss on the word. "I noticed."
They both knew that nothing more would be said on the subject.
Between them and the waters edge was a wide and shelving beach that, as far as they could see, circled the whole way around. Certainly it seemed to disappear into the distance on both sides, but the oddly shifting light made it hard to judge how far that might be. Whatever the distance it would not be an easy walk for tongues of rock, sharp and wide with ridged and folded surfaces, stuck out into the waters on either side of them. 'Like liquorish larded tongues' Elanor found herself thinking, 'as if the land is mocking the water.' But they would be a hard climb and she was aware of the reaction to the trauma of the grief sending spears of fatigue into her blood and muscle. There was little choice though, unless they tried to climb back up to the forest hanging above them. Knowing what waited there was not much incentive to do that. She looked at the rock bones again; it might be worth the effort of the climb for they should prove a good vantage point from which to decide where they should go next. Maybe they would even give them a sight of the fountain, assuming there was one here to be seen.
They were standing on the back edge of the beach and behind them the slope they had tumbled down showed black and glassy where they had torn the plant life from the underlying rock in their fall. The sand beneath their boots was no more commonplace than that rock or the water in front of them, for it shone a silvery grey in the strange half light and its surface looked as cold as the water. Like shattered pearl it seemed insubstantial, a disconcerting surface to walk upon. Jack stared down at it for a moment, knowing that he didn't trust the look of it but also knowing that they had little choice if they were to finish this matter to his satisfaction. Certainly he had no intention of climbing back up that slope for a while yet.
He found himself strangely disinclined to move, wondering what waited for them if they set out on a trek across these sands, a benighted strip that reminded so much of things he wished to avoid. Yet there was no other way that he could think of. Nor would it be good to be seen to hang back, for she might decide to cut and run given her anguish of moments ago. Jack pushed the echoes of his own aguish away and squared his shoulders; turning back towards the lake he waved a fluttering hand in its direction, his rings sparking all colours of the rainbow in the silver light.
"Is this it then do you think? The fountain of youth?"
Elanor gave that a moment of thought before shaking her head, even though he was turned away from her,
"Can't see a fountain Jack, but I'll grant you that might just be a picturesque description rather than a factual one."
He shrugged and looked down, frowning and kicking his toe into the sand for a moment or two, then he shrugged again,
"Only one way to find out. We'll have to walk around it. The compass says its here, the fountain, whatever it looks like. "
He pushed away a sudden memory of the compass's past confusions. Was he so sure that he wanted to find the fountain after all? Was there something here that he didn't know about but that some part of him would want more? ''Course not ' he scoffed at himself. There was nothing more important than ridding himself of the gnawing fear of the locker, a fear that had been his constant companion, sleeping and waking, since he had sailed back to the living seas. No the fountain was here.
"So it is here." he heard himself say, "It might be on the other side."
Something tightened in his chest and he turned towards her, his face stiff as his shoulders,
"You don't have to come with me if you chose not. I'll agree this place is not safe and if you want to stay here I'll not argue with that."
She gave him a faint half smile,
"And staying here alone would make it safer?" She shook her head, and straightened her shoulders as if preparing to face an enemy, "No I'll come with you, I can't tell you why but I've a strong feeling that we are safer when we are together."
Jack frowned briefly again then nodded before spinning around and starting out across the sand, but not quickly enough to hide the relief in his face. Half a dozen paces away he stopped again and threw a challenging smile back over his shoulder,
"Well come on then, no sense in delaying. Sooner we move sooner we gain our treasure."
Then with a flick of his head he sauntered away.
With a faint sigh, and a feeling of relief at the resuming of normal relations, she followed him.
***
As another evening fell Hathaway and Groves extended their acquaintance with Tortuga, an experience that Groves at least could well have done without.
His fear of discovery was somewhat lessened he had to admit, for even his mother would not have recognised him now. The sweat had turned his hair to rats tails and the dust and sand blown on the hot wind had gathered on his scalp like the crust on an old and unused canon, his shirt was patched with dark sweat stains, and ale stains too where they had been brushed by some of the towns more inebriated occupants. His sweat slicked skin shone as if greased in the light of the tavern flames and more dirt and dust had found its way into the creases at wrist and elbow and under his fingernails, joining the layer they had engrained there before starting this venture. The men and women who passed them in the narrow alleys didn't even give them a glance.
Looking across at Hathaway Groves could not be surprised, knowing himself to look no better he could only be glad that the port was very poorly provided with mirrors, or even window glass come to that. For the first time it occurred to him that Sparrow had always been remarkably tidy, and even clean, for a man who lived with little benefit of civilisation and frequented such places.
He wondered for a moment if James Norrington had managed to maintain his fastidious neatness in such a place, if he had then Groves could not imagine how.
They had swilled their heads and forearms in a water butt beside the barn where they had slept the afternoon away, but that was as close to washing as they had come since they had left the Intrepid. Groves was sure that he stank, for the heavy air did not dry the sweat the effort of moving produced. Though they had returned to their lodgings as the day faded towards night it had been to do nothing more than collect a coin or two from the small stash Hathaway had secreted beneath the floor boards, and to be seen. Then they had set off to find food and ale as any other male occupant, and many female occupants, of this town would do at this hour.
The sound of shouting and the rasp of steel on steel had steered them away from the quay and towards a quieter area; getting killed in a street brawl formed no part of their orders, at least as far as Groves was aware it didn't. The cook shops were doing good business and it took them time to find one where they could find a safe place to sit. After a bowl of thin stew, 'better not to think of the likely contents' Groves reminded himself, and a surprisingly good sweet suet duff, rich with banana and molasses, washed down with a passable ale, they set off to seek information once again.
But the rounds of the taverns provided no new information, at least none they could find without asking too many questions, at least not until they came across the woman.
***
The pearly sand was soft and deep, running over their boots like something alive and catching at their ankles as they walked. Each step seemed to take forever and the muscles of her legs were aching well before they made the first of proved to be bountiful rocky obstructions.
They had crossed the first rocky tongue with little more than scraped hands and knees, for though the rock was deeply ridged and folded it was not sharp. Looking at it more closely Elanor noted the glass like nature of it, as if it had been softened in great heat and had flowed towards the water until the weight of it, or something now gone, had brought it to a halt.
They had climbed the crest of it and stared out towards the water but in the end they had gained little by the effort, for all the vantage point had shown them was a seemingly larger stretch of placid water, its edge curving much as it had done when they stood on the sands and with more of the rocky outcrops dividing the continuing sweep of shore. Jack had sworn long and emphatically in a language she did not recognise, at least she had assumed from his thunderous frown that that was what he was doing. He had caught up a small pebble and cast it towards the water, but it had fallen far short of the edge even though she would have sworn that it should not have done so. That had brought another curse. Drawing a deep breath, he squared his shoulders, glared in the direction of the shoreline and then spun around and set off again without a word. Slithering down the far side of the rock to the sands as if he didn't notice the drop.
They had tried again at the second one and the third but by the fourth they were exhausted, leg muscles turned to lead and knee and hip joints screaming protest. The sand seemed to have become thicker and softer, requiring that they wade through it rather than walk across it, and it seemed that they had been wading for hours. As they slithered rather than climbed down the side of that fourth impertinent tongue of rock both of them knew they needed rest. The air was hot and lazy, even this distance below the forest, and the shore line was still shrouded in the silver blue light, it seemed to soften the line between land and water and rock and sand and there was no sign of a return to the brighter light that they had seen in the forest above them.
They collapsed into a heap on the sand and leant back against the glassy rock,
"Seems like we are getting nowhere," Jack grumbled as he dropped his pack onto the floor beside him and pulled out the water bottle.
"I know. Each stretch of sand looks just like every other and the view of the water doesn't change either. Even these rock outcrops look the same. So how do we know if we are half way around or even if we have arrived back at where we started?"
He shrugged, thought for a moment and then clambered to his feet, after a second ot two more thought he pulled a long thick thread from the frayed sash around his waist, rolled it into a little ball and stuffed it well down into a small hole in the rock,
"Each time we check, if we don't see this then we know we are still on new ground."
He collapsed onto the sand again, leaning back and rubbing his eyes with the heel of his hand,
"I don't know how long we've been here but it feels like days."
"Yes, it does. I need sleep. You need sleep too."
"Aye, but not both of us at once. I'll not have some conniving beasties catching us unawares."
Elanor looked around at the barren shoreline,
"I agree, though I'm not sure where they would come from."
Jack considered the silent green waters through narrowed eyes then nodded his head in its direction,
"I'd say that has a trick or too up it's watery sleeve."
He sighed, then with a sudden bound got to his feet again sketching a bow before indicating the shelter of the rock spar with a circling hand,
"Your couch milady." He quirked an eyebrow and smiled, "rest easy, I'll stand as your ever watchful guardian."
Elanor suppressed a smile, and graciously inclined her head before stretching out on the sand. There was a moment when she wondered why it was so cold when the air was so warm then she was asleep.
***
Groves wasn't sure which of Captain Hathaway's skills he admired, or feared the most. The man's ability to fit himself to his surroundings had to be high up the list, but maybe not any higher than his ability to get people to talk; this second skill certainly made Groves nervous when alone in his company. How and where he had honed such a skill was something the nervous lieutenant didn't want to think much about, for he was sure that was a course that would lead into very uncomfortable waters. It said much for those skills that he managed to get them a place opposite one of the few people in Tortuga who might know what Gibbs and even Sparrow were up to, and to keep her talking when she had other calls upon her time. For it was likely that she was no lady of leisure.
Her name was Giselle, or so she claimed, and it was clear that she was what he mother would have described as a ruined woman, however it was also quite clear that by Tortuga standards she had some way to go to ruin. Whore she might well be, probably was, but she was as far from the drabs they had seen haunting the poorer parts of town as his sister would be from her. Yet she was not the youngest of her profession they had seen, as he let his eyes wander the room he could see girls who were barely of an age to put up their hair and let down their skirts curled in the laps of drunken men and whispering enticements to pay to climb the stairs to the tawdry rooms above. But the woman opposite was no young girl, in his circles she would have been married some seasons ago, or having nightmares of being forever being a spinster.
Groves looked her over carefully as Hathaway provided her with a wine, taking care not to meet her eyes. They had heard that she was one of Sparrow's favourites, that she and one other woman commanded all his attentions when he was in port, and he wondered how much of her prosperity depended upon that. For her relative prosperity was flaunted for all to see. Her dress was more than fine by Tortuga standards it was glorious, the golden coloured watered silk of the tight bodice and flowing skirt almost unmarked and the dark embroidery, bows and floss and lace trimming were intact. All of which suggested that this was not her only dress. As simple attire it was a mile away from the dark homespun and soiled linen shifts of the other street walkers they had come across, but more that that for it had a style and refinement unusual in one of her probable profession and in such a place. Her carefully painted face and elaborately arranged hair also spoke of her status, it seemed unlikely she had ever tussled for a coin in a dark alley dressed this way. The fine pendent earrings she wore might not have been diamond but they were good imitations and set in gold, certainly they would not have remained her possession for long had she been a street walking drab. Someone had provided the lady with some very expensive and fine attire and ensured that she kept hold of it, Groves doubted that it had come from a dockside pimp. Not a whore then, more a courtesan if such a thing could exist here. Most telling was that Giselle had an air of independence about her, and that she looked a man in the eye and did not cringe or jump when a voice was raised across the room. No, if it hadn't been for the very quality of her dress, and the low cut of her neckline, far lower than modesty decreed, and that careful face paint he might have taken her for the widow of a wealthy merchant or the spoilt daughter of a successful captain.
But whatever else she was it seemed that she was indeed a favourite of Jack Sparrow. Or that she hoped that she was. For it had not taken Hathaway long to get her to talk on the subject of the man.
"Jack's not been in port for more than a two month now. That means he's got something profitable underway for he never stays away that long unless he's up to something."
"Always profitable is it, what Jack Sparrow gets up to?"
Her smile was almost proprietorial and certainly proud,
"Not wanted on three continents for nothin' is he?"
"Heard he were in port near a month ago, " Hathaway drawled, then watched her closely over the top of his tankard, "with a woman so says."
"Not true. Can't be otherwise I would have seen him." She raised her glass to Hathaway with a wry smile; "if he'd kept company with Scarlett instead then she would have made sure that I knew of it."
Hathaway shook his head,
"Maybe he didn't see either of you, maybe he kept hisself to this woman they talk of."
Giselle snorted,
"Not Jack, if he were here Scarlett or me would have known, " her hand strayed up to those fine earrings, "He'd not come and go without dallying a little." A sudden thought occurred to her and a frown creased her forehead, "though he was strange the last time we saw him 'tis true."
"From what I hear he's always strange." Hathaway scoffed seeming uninterested as he refilled her glass, though nothing could have been further from the truth.
Giselle shook her head as she took a gulp of wine,
"Only those that don't know him say that, or those that don't understand." She set her glass down with a snap, and looked down at the scarred table top "Jack's a clever man you see, more than most, and he had an education," she said the unfamiliar words with pride as if in some way it reflected on her. "Reads does Jack, books and things and not just what he has to read. He makes maps too with the most wonderful drawings and a fine script," the pride emerged again, "he can write just like a gentleman. Uses words I ain't never heard before as if they were ordinary!"
Her eyes came up to meet Hathaway's and Groves was surprised to see the look there, pride again and affection and something else that softened her look,
"He's a pirate but he ain't like most, he ain't a bully. Never asked what a girl might not want to give, nor raised a hand against me or Scarlett, or any other woman I ever heard of, and I'll admit that on occasions ..well we might have given him some cause. What another man might think cause anyways. I've slapped him more than a time or two, aye and refused him when I was weary, but he's never hit back with hand or word, nor given sign that he might. I've seen him angry, and made him angry a few times, but he's never given me cause for complaint. "
"Your protector is he?" Hathaway asked slowly,
Groves didn't understand what he was saying until he saw the anger flare in the woman's eyes,
"Jack's no pimp." She hissed. "If he were.... well there's more than one woman who would be weeping into the night. Took a governor's daughter some time back he did, and never laid a hand on her, handed her back to her father in the state he found her. Not many would do that. Not if they knew the price he could have had for her here or in one of the bawdy houses of the east, even if he'd taken his pleasure first. There's many a Spanish nobleman, aye and gentleman too, who would enjoy the rape of an English governors daughter. He could have had his fun with her and some profit too."
Groves swallowed hard and tried not to think about the fate that Elizabeth had found, not much better in the end than the one the woman opposite spoke of, and it had been Beckett who had sold her into it not the pirate. He looked up to see the glare fading from Giselle's face,
"Got a good heart has Jack, and there are those who will tell you that he never chose this life. I don't know about that, but I do know that he's no devil or beast for all the posters say about his crimes."
She took another swallow of wine and pointed a finger at Hathaway,
"But don't go thinking that means he's soft for he ain't, pirate he is for whatever reason and clever man that he is he's good at it, possibly the best there has ever been, and I ain't forgetting about Morgan and Bartholomew neither! No pirate he is sure enough and pirate Lord too. Can be a hard man, but always fair, even those that have taken again him admit that. "
"Owes a lot of people money so I've heard. Maybe they'd have a different view." Groves spoke for the first time and she seemed surprised at his temerity, for she looked him over haughtily before she inclined her head in his direction, for all the world like a dowager duchess accepting a man's hand in the dance for her daughter.
"Maybe he does, but that doesn't mean he ain't got no money. " She spoke kindly still in duchess mode, "he don't carry it around with him that's all."
Her hand stroked the silk over her thighs and the duchess look gave way to the saucy servant girl. She cast an uncertain look from Groves to Hathaway and back again but the wine was wearing down her caution and she suddenly smiled and leaned forward across the table, though taking care to keep her dress from touching it,
"And for good reason. Jack likes to owe people money, more than the reward for him that is, he says that livin' in the hope of being paid disinclines them to sell him to the authorities." She giggled and leaned closer, "Once when he was in a really good mood he told me that he when he became a pirate lord he made sure that he owed all the other pirate Lords a lot of money so that it gave them and their captains a motivation not to attack him and to help him stay alive."
"He said that did he?" Hathway said faintly, "My, my." his words tailed off uncertainly.
Groves repressed a smile for Hathway was looking uncharacteristically stunned.
Giselle sat back in her chair smiling at Hathaway's look.
"Aye he did. Told you, Jack's a clever man." The pride was back in her voice, "Cos he's right, if he's dead they don't get paid and nothing like the hope of being paid to keep people on your side." She winked at the two men over the rim of her glass, "at least when you've got a pistol or two and sword at your belt, and enough grit to prevent them taking it out of your hide."
"But strange." Groves spoke up again, "You said he was strange the last time you saw him, maybe one of those people he owed money too decided they would settle for his hide instead."
Giselle shook her head,
"No, he weren't worried or afraid, even when he saw his ship were gone." She frowned in recollection, "but surprised like and then sad, and sort of weary. That ship meant it all to him or so it seemed. When he saw it gone again it.... well ... it were only then that he said some strange things, it were like...like he were goin' away and never coming back. So he were sayin' things that he'd thought before but not said, or that he'd never dared to say before Slapped him real heard we did." Her look changed and suddenly she seemed upset, "Like he were never comin' back again so he were setting the record straight."
Both Hathaway and Groves suppressed a flinch at the sudden fear flaring in her eyes, and not just fear, for as she spoke the last words tears brightened her eyes and both men wondered just how much Jack Sparrow was her in reality her protector, even when he wasn't here, and how much she dreaded him being gone. Certainly she was horrified at the thought that he might never return and her fingers strayed up to those earrings again as if touching some form of enchanted talisman. They seemed to give her some reassurance because she straightened her back and took a deep swallow of her wine,
"But o'course it were just Jack nonsense. He'll be back, he always does. When he's got his ship back again he'll make port here soon as he can. I'm sure of it."
But they were not sure that even she believed it.
Jack wasn't sure how long he stood sentinel, staring out towards the still water, for there was nothing to mark time in this place, nor was he sure why he decided to climb the rock sheltering them again. But climb it he did, checking at intervals to make sure Elanor was still sleep. She did not stir, lying curled in the sand with her hair splayed behind her and one hand resting on her belt, as if ready to summon the lightening even in her sleep. He smiled lazily to himself as he climbed, there was no denying she was a useful ally, she and her ship and he with his would make for a legend to rival that of the Dutchman.
Yet the Dutchman's legend was fading, for all the eyes that had seen it. Jack had expected nothing less, for men had always been good at discounting that which was uncomfortable. There was no denying the ferryman was that, for if he existed after all what else might not be as they had thought? More than the parson in his pulpit had cause to banish such thought in a hurry. The days in Tortuga had revealed that the legend of the Flying Dutchman was already changing, old stories and new ones fusing to produce a hybrid that did not really reflect past or present. One thing was clear though, to the common sailor the name of Davy Jones lived on while Will Turner remained unknown.
Only those with cause to recall the Dutchman still, and motivation to remember what she was and had done, hung on to the undeniable truth of her. But they, too, did not know of Will and assumed Jones still to be at the helm; which was why they were hunting him of course, for they must believe he had forced Jones to destroy the Endeavour, or freed him to do so. Believing that they must also believe that he had gained a hold over Jones. A misapprehension he would not correct, for many reasons. Though it had been hard to persuade Teague to agree, he had not taken to Elizabeth, nor Will, and only the reminder that their Lordships belief in such a hold would keep the Navy from Shipwreck had convinced him.
But he had given his word and, like Barbossa, he would stick to it. Jack had been careful to make sure that the bargain he stuck to was, in all detail, the one that was necessary. Only Teague and his crew, and Jack, knew where Elizabeth was now. He had hoped that soon even they would be able to forget, but what he had seen and heard in Tortuga raised uncomfortable possibilities,and it might yet be wise to move her beyond even Teague's knowing. For though the man would keep to his word he might not hold his tongue, not when in his cups. One man at least had survived the sinking of the Endeavour, maybe more, and there was no certainty that they hadn't seen Elizabeth, nor even that they had not seen William. With enough time to think about it a clever man might work it out. Even the navy must have some clever men, one that had surviced Beckett.
He needed the Pearl, once had found the fountain he would set his mind to taking her back again. He looked down again at Elanor still sleeping below him, would she lend him her aid again after this trek? Would she help him regain the Pearl? Perhaps for maybe she would want rid of him? Maybe she already wanted rid of him, for she must regret the presence of another captain on her ship however silent she had been on the subject. If he explained to her that he needed the ship to netter hide Elizabeth then perhaps she might help him, though in truth he had seen no sign of motherly instincts in her at all and she might well not take to the Governor's daughter.
Jack grinned to himself as he let his mind wander over the possibilities involved in the meeting of the two of them, an encounter with interesting possibilities of various kinds.
But he needed the Pearl for he could not take herself and her ship with its ghost to Elizabeth and risk them being spotted. That would draw a lot of very unwelcome attention, just when he would most need to avoid it. He halted in his climb, but if he took the Pearl then he would need a crew, and they would know what he didn't want them to know. Bugger! He could kill them he supposed, but was he really ready to do that? No, he knew he was not. He had every intention of having to live with himself for a very long time yet, and killing a crew to protect Elizabeth's safety would mean that he couldn't. It seemed that he had no choice, not even if they found the fountain, he would have to plead with Elanor and hope they didn't get spotted. Bugger!
In a spurt of irritation he leaned against the rock and stared out towards the silent water. Well offshore the air was thickening and a haze hung above the surface, like a sea fret. Through the mist he could see a shadow, it took several moments for him to realise it was a ship at anchor. Tall and dark, sails reefed, her mast clawing black fingers up towards the featureless sky, the Black Pearl sat on the green water and waited for him