**Author's note: As I go on, this piece becomes more and more challenging to write.  Thank you all for the effusive feedback, and if I begin to go astray in any part of my writing, do not hesitate to let me know.  For now, I am enjoying the praise, suggestions, and support you all are giving me.  If my updates begin to slow, have no fear.  I'll never make you wait too long.**

            The bright peaks and resplendent inhabitants of Olympians suddenly shattered to pieces as Amelia's carefully constructed mental mural was interrupted by the sounds of shouts, shrieks, and feet pounding across the deck.  She couldn't tell if the Pearl's crew had been victorious, or if they'd finally had the tables turned on them. 

            She'd been sitting for far too long, and as she stood, her ankles tingled with the pins and needles of long discomfort.  To read the Roman myths had been interesting, but to read the words that had accompanied Jack's childhood had been irresistible.  Now, however, with ample evidence that the pirates were back from their pirating, Amelia's curiosity reared its head again.  Sliding the book under the bed, she vowed to come back to it—and to find out exactly how Jack had came to own it again. 

            Amelia hefted the dagger in her hand and crossed to the door, pressing her ear to it.  Pushing her shoulder against the heavy wood, she listened to the rattle of iron the movement produced.  Taking a deep breath, she shoved the blade between the door and the jamb, hoping for the scrape of metal on metal.  If she could pry around the hasp holding the door, she could get out and see what in Zeus's name all the commotion was about.

            So intent was she on her task that Amelia didn't notice the shouts die down or the consequent sound of approaching footsteps.

            Feeling the hasp give a little, Amelia gasped and leaned harder on the door. 

            She was still grasping the dagger in her fist when she spilled out the door and at Jack's feet.

~~~

            "Bloody joykill," Jack muttered as he walked away from the gathered crew.  Stalking toward the latched door to his cabin, he talked to himself with increasing volume.  "What I need is a good stiff drink and a good loose woman."  So saying, he flipped the piece of iron that held Amelia captive.

            He saw the door swing toward him and jumped back with an oath on his lips.  If he'd been a bit slower, the idiot would have sliced him open.  As he looked down on the pile of breathless woman at his feet, he noted she would have sliced him open with his own dagger. 

            "Cock and pie!" she spat, wrestling with the skirts of her dress to stand.  "It's about bloody time you came back.  'Tisn't an animal I am, I don't need to be locked away."  In her embarrassment, Amelia became defensive, and as always, her face gave her away.  A very strong and very guilty blush crept over her cheeks as she slapped dirt from her bottom.

            Though the sight of her little hands slapping at that rear was enticing, Jack couldn't quite wrap his head around the fact that he'd been defending the woman's honor while she'd been sacking through his things.  Spreading a hand in the direction of the thoroughly tossed room, he bit back a curse.  This was the woman he'd nearly offed a member of his crew for.  Irony was a relentless bitch.  "What exactly is it you were attempting to do, love?" 

            "Escape, isn't that quite clear?"  Rolling her eyes, she slapped the dagger blade-first into the hand and crossed her arms over her chest.  "Well?" she said expectantly, tapping her foot on the deck. 

            "Well, what?  You've nothing to get from me, ye nagging shrew!" he exclaimed, tossing the weapon into the room and nodding with satisfaction as it stuck into the wall next to his bed.  He whirled on her then, finger pointed at her.  "Don't expect me to do what ye say simply because ye act wronged.  I've played that particular tune too many times in my life to start to dance to it meself."  He paced a few steps away, then turned back.  "Besides, Miss Appropriate, oh She of the Blueblood Manners, it would be best if ye'd just forget about tonight.  I highly doubt someone of your sensitively sensitive sensibilities would much like to hear of thievery."  But when he looked at her, what he saw wasn't judgment.

            It was more of that insatiable curiosity.

            Why, he wondered, oh, why can't she be insatiable elsewhere?  "Stop looking at me like that.  It was just an on-and-off sort of deal.  The man on the ship was a pantywaist jack of legs, passed out on the deck just like a weak-stomached woman, and we took his things."  Speaking quickly, he flicked a hand in the air dismissively, and she noticed the glitter of one new ring.  "Go on," he said loudly.  "In case you're out of practice with your impeccable morals, now is when you judge, love, when you tell me what a cad I am."

            Amelia tore her eyes away from the ring and met eyes with him coolly.  The fun-loving, tempting devil's eyes were back, having been only temporarily replaced by the eyes of a mere mortal.  "Though I'm sure you think it has escaped my notice, it occurs to me that my sensitively sensitive sensibilities are not half as well-rooted as your piratical impulses.  Therefore, I concede to your pastime and take what enjoyment I can from it, as I, too, can be a selfish sort." As she'd spoken, she'd intentionally let her words gather momentum, tumbling over one another in a half-slurred patter that very closely matched his.  As she wrapped up her speech, she cocked her head challengingly.

            "Well then, they're your sensibilities."  He offered his arm to her, smiling pleasantly, and she counted herself the victor as she took his arm.

            Then he began to speak, casually, conversationally, with the viper he had in place of a tongue.

            "You know, love, I passed up something positively wonderful on that ship, and had I realize I was in such need of it, I'd have certainly picked it up and tucked it into my sack, but whyever would I have dreamed of needing a muzzle for a human?"

            As he led her below decks to see the booty for herself, Amelia wondered why she hadn't held onto the dagger after all.

~~~

            From a dark corner near the shot locker, Daniel Carrington watched his captain with a jaundiced eye, speaking to the few men gathered around him in low, hissing tones. 

            "It's a bloody insult, it is.  I don't want to work on no bloody hen-frigate, that's for sure.  I'd sooner be hanged by a bit o'red than stay on a ship where a filly rules all, especially when she's no more'n a stowaway, playin' whore for the crazy cap'n--"

            "That crazy captain isn't the only one on this ship who'd just as soon kill ye as look at ye, ye gotch-gutted idiot."  A mouthful of spit hit the deck at Daniel's feet, the perfect accompaniment to the words Anamaria spoke.  "She's no more whore than you are commodore." 

            Daniel's face turned the ugly purple of an enraged drunk and he stood to face the smaller woman.  "Ye think so, do ye?  Well, yer a fine one to talk, woman.  No one wanted ye on this ship in the first place, no matter how much ye dress like a man.  Surely 'tis beggin' for the Devil's own ire to house a Mary dressed as a Davey, eh, boys?"  He shoved at Anamaria, sending her into plain sight of both Jack and Amelia.

            Jack had brought her to the hold reluctantly, showing her what they'd gotten merely because she seemed to take such a joy in it.  Jack knew as surely as he knew it about himself that she'd seen little beauty and even littler joy in her life.  The least he could do was show her the prettier side of the Caribbean.

            Or he would have, had Daniel not started laying hands on Anamaria.  "Hold here," he told Amelia in a low voice, starting over to the scuffle with his deceptively slow walk, his seemingly distracted air.

            At that moment, she couldn't have moved even if she'd wanted to.  As Daniel shouted at Anamaria, his words became another's, the furious gestured mirrored a thousand times in Amelia's mind.

            "Oh, ho there cap'n, ye come to draw yer big sword, show us all how great y'are?" 

            Oh, where ye goin', Amelia, yer nose stuck in a book again?  Go outside and play with yer brother, ye unnatural thing. 

            "Oh, no, Daniel, I've just come to see what the popular subject of discussion was.  You know, I'm never quite able to resist a conversation when it's all about me.  Happens to be my favorite topic, you know." 

            Daniel's face clouded as that of a scolded child and he glared at Jack from beneath two thick, black eyebrows.  "Aye, ye're a bastard like that, y'are," he said petulantly, holding an empty bottle by the neck.

            Yer such a greedy slattern, y'know that?  Why won't ye share with me, sister?

            "I find myself disappointed in you, Daniel, for I thought we surely discussed this matter early and found ourselves at a much less disappointing conclusion than the one I'm forced to face at the moment, which is that you're unable to keep your mouth from being such a bagpipe."  Laying a hand to his chest, he shook his head sorrowfully.

            "Forget ye and yer bloody disappointment, Captain.  Go on about your business, tuppin' yer  game-pullet there."  Sneering, his bravery restored, Daniel tossed the bottle in Amelia's direction, jeering loudly as she uttered a small scream.

            Forget about yer wages, ye lazy whore. 

            And when the bottle broke, that meant broken glass, and the cuts that inevitably came with it.

            Blind to the things around her and sick with the knowledge that she'd never be able to escape what was past, Amelia stared wide-eyed at each of the pirates in turn, and last of all at Jack, then gathered her skirts and fled to the upper deck.

            As she went, the two halves of Jack split further, one half wishing to dole out retribution to the drunk, foul-mouthed young pirate in front of him, the other half wishing to follow his charge above.

            Taking a handful of the man's shirt and twisting it into a crude but effective garrote, Jack brought his face close to Daniel's and spoke without a slur.  "Make you no mistake, mate, should I find you handling another crew member or even saying something so mild as you don't the way I dress, you'll be finding your neck a bit longer than 'twas before you started out." 

            He released the man and turned away without looking back, and he could tell by the sounds of movement behind him that the only listeners Daniel had gathered were already moving away.

            She was in her cot when he crept into his cabin, still in the dress rather than the nightwear he'd found for her.  Her back was to him, and she was perfectly still.

            For her sake, he hoped she was asleep.

            "I'd ask your pardon," he said quietly, scrubbing a hand over his face.  "But ye'd not pardon one such as myself."

            Her eyes squeezed tightly shut, blocking out the sights and sounds of the family she'd never loved, Amelia felt her heart break just a little more.