Angry eyes, bloodshot and red-rimmed, mouth moving in a soundless shout, words without volume. A large hand, wavering in the air before coming down on her own small hand, large fist grinding small fingers together. A snap, loud and sickening, so painful it put colors behind her closed eyelids.
How many broken bones did that make? She didn't know, had stopped counting as a small, bullied child. He grabbed her by the hair, jerking her head to one side—
And Amelia woke up gasping, both hands tensely poised in claws, the tendons in her hands standing out clearly. Slowly relaxing her hands, she sat up and shoved them through her messy hair. She was alone in the cabin, surrounded by things that smelled of him. She knew, after spending the night among all those shirts, she too would smell like him.
Letting out a shaky breath, she wished she could write her dream off as a nightmare. But it was a memory, one of thousands like it. The week he'd broken her finger, she'd laundered with her index finger tightly bound in an old rag one of the nuns had discarded. Though she knew it was un-Christian, she hoped the bastard was alone somewhere with his entire hand wrapped in filthy rags.
Fully away she would be unable to return to sleep, Amelia got out of the cot and began gathering armloads of shirts and breeches, studiously avoiding looking at any of them intently. She divided them into several piles according to the type of clothing they were, wondering how long it had been since he'd last done laundry.
Judging by the amount of clothing, he'd not done it at all, merely tossed it aside in favor of something else he'd either bought or stolen.
Only after she had divided everything did Amelia find a small tub and a cake of lye soap that had been obscured by the clothing. Dumping a heaping armful of shirts into the tub, she wrested them out the door and onto the main deck.
The sun had not yet risen, and only a few crewmen were on deck, undoubtedly keeping watch. Though their eyes were sharp and alert, their bodies drooped from weariness, and with every moment the dark lessened and highlighted the worn lines of their faces.
Walking to the stern of the boat, Amelia set the wash down and put her hands to her hips, studying the lay of the ship until she spotted what she wanted. Grabbing the rope-tethered pail, she tested the knots and tossed it overboard, letting the rope slide through her fingers until it hit the water far below. Twitching the rope, she felt the pail start to take in water and smiled in satisfaction, strengthening her grip against the hard pull.
She'd been young, just a girl, the one and only time she'd gone out to sea with her father. She'd demanded to know everything, to be taught the knots, to know the names of the fish. It had been one of the last wonderful days in her young life.
It had been one of the last days of her childhood.
With a small grunt, both to shake off the memory and to lend her strength, Amelia hauled up the bucket she'd filled with saltwater, transferring it from pail to tub.
"We've something in common then, as it seems you're an early riser." He'd been watching her for several moments, surprised that she'd spoke to no one, asked for no help.
Unsurprised by his presence, Amelia went to her knees in front of the washtub, the sleeves of the dress pushed above her elbows. "'Tisn't by choice. I could not sleep."
Something else in common, Jack thought. "You know, love, there's freshwater below."
Finally she looked up at him, blowing a lock of dark hair out of her eyes and fervently wishing he'd disappear. It was humiliating to sit on the deck of his ship in the wee hours of the morning, dressed in finery but scrubbing his clothes like a servant. "The salt in the water will keep them from freezing or being stiff if I'm to hang them out here." He looked up at the sky, eyes narrowed, lips slightly parted as though he was sipping the wind. "It'll be light in less than an hour, and this deck will be busy."
"I'll not need an hour to finish your shirts, unless you insist on nattering at me the entire time I'm scrubbing at them." Remembering that she was obligated to him, she sighed and added, "Sir."
Rolling his eyes, Jack crouched down to her level. "Oh, now that's rich, innit? You callin' me 'sir' after threatening to kill me yesterday." She started to speak, the anger in her eyes clear, but he held up a hand and closed his eyes. "No, no, hush, love—I'd like to savor this moment. It's clearly my victory when a woman who despises me calls me sir. And she hasn't even slapped me yet, which is remarkable indeed. No one will ever believe it." Noting that a corner of her mouth was pulling into something dangerously close to a smile, he added, "I scarcely believe it myself."
Biting the insides of her cheeks, Amelia returned her full attention to the shirts.
It was going to be a long morning.
~~~
"Te...tee...
aa… cuh… huh." Anamaria rolled her
eyes. "It don't
take a bloody blue-stocking to know that doesn't make a word."
Trying to roll the crick from her neck, Amelia sighed. "Doesn't. It doesn't take a blue-stocking. And it does make a word. Try C-H as you would in…" Amelia struggled to find something Anamaria could relate to. Obviously "chapel" wouldn't work. "Chart!" she said suddenly. "C-H makes the sound at the beginning of chart."
"Bloody ridiculous," the unwilling pupil muttered, but she reapplied her attention to the page in front of her. "Te… tee…atch. Teach."
Word by word, she struggled to read the first stanza of the poem aloud. By the end of an hour, Amelia felt as though they'd been there for twice as long. But the visible progress was rewarding.
Without a word of thanks or departure, Anamaria left the wardroom when the bell rang for the evening meal. Sighing heavily and not feeling a bit hungry, Amelia dropped her head to the table and wished fervently the ship would dock somewhere soon.
"Look alive, love."
She jerked her head up, a guilty blush staining her cheeks. She'd been near to falling asleep there in the wardroom. One hour with Anamaria was definitely more exhausting than the three tubs of laundry she'd done throughout the day, moving her tub each time to keep away from the majority of the crew. They never came near her, but after hearing several of them discuss exactly why Jack was keeping her aboard, she was burning with shame and barely reigning in her indignation. Now, as she looked blearily at Jack, she knew her deal with the devil had carried a steep enough price, indeed. He'd drive her mad or she'd die of exhaustion before they ever reached port. With the same negligent flick of the wrist he'd used to toss his coins to her, he tossed a piece of fruit across the room.
She caught it one-handed, her small fingers curling around it. "'Tis a strange-looking fruit," she admitted, turning it in her fingers.
"Pomegranate," he said, stepping forward and pulling a dagger from his belt. "Though the inside's the good part. Much like a woman, aye?" Enjoying her blush, he split the fruit open, revealing the rosy particles inside. "No worries, love. Eating it won't tether you to the netherworld as queen of my ship."
Startled, her eyes flew to his. It had been just what she was thinking, of Persephone's fate. "How did you know that?"
"Because you've a morbid fascination with evil, Miss Hamilton. Everything with you is about the devil. Deals with the devil, like Marlowe's tale, fallen angels as Milton's. Or is it just that everything about me is devilish?" Knowing he hadn't answered the question as she'd wanted, he sat down in Anamaria's vacated spot and popped a piece of the fruit into his mouth.
She took a piece of it experimentally, turning his answer over in her mind. What use had a pirate for Marlowe, Milton, and mythology? "This is good," she said suddenly, looking at the pomegranate on the table. "But wherever did you get it?"
He shook his head, beads clicking softly. "You wouldn't want to know, love."
"I've a powerful curiosity," she reminded him, starting to enjoy herself.
Kicking his chair back on two legs and hooking a worn boot under the edge of the table, he regarded her. "I think you have," he agreed. "A bit frightening, it is. Let's just say an Eastern merchant and I made a bit of a trade."
"The fruit for…?" She left the sentence open, waiting for him to finish it.
Jack looked hurt and he put a hand to his chest, sighing hugely. "You underestimate me, love. Not the fruit. All of his cargo in exchange for—" he paused to heighten the anticipation, leaning forward even as she did. "His life."
She swallowed hard, searching his face for something. "Truly?"
Jack weighed between his pride and his reputation with Amelia and found they were somehow, at least at the moment, intertwined. "Well, love, 'tisn't as though I'd have actually killed him. If I had dropped him off the side of the ship, he'd have surely been able to swim."
"Surely," she agreed, mocking his nearly-slurring accent. "What a scoundrel you are, Jack Sparrow." She stood up and started to grab her book. "Thank you for the pomegranate."
"When is it that you'll actually be done with the Donne?" he asked, thumping a knuckle on the book and making her freeze.
"I'm not sure," she said slowly, wanting to test him, wanting to know the depths of what he knew. "Since Anamaria's only up to mermaids singing."
He sighed then, his eyes losing the ever-present intensity, growing faraway. A smile, soft and vulnerable, flitted over his mouth. "Aye. 'Tis my favorite part of the whole bit. I've been on these waters for many a year now, and I've still not tracked down those damned mermaids."
Sitting back down, Amelia reached for her book, her hand brushing against his. She left it where it was instead of jerking back, needing him to keep that moment of vulnerability, knowing that if he stayed there, she could exercise a bit more of her unlimited curiosity.
"Who are you?" she asked quietly. "Or more to the point, Captain Jack Sparrow, who were you?"
