I know, I know, it's been AGES, hasn't it? Sorry, everybody. Here's a
nice LONG update, just to make it up to you all. Please don't kill me....
*
"You can keep doing that forever, the dog is never going to come," Jack drawled, watching the efforts of the prisoners in the next cell.
"Oh, excuse us if we haven't resigned ourselves to the gallows just yet!" one of them snapped.
Jack only smiled, leaned back against the wall, and pulled his battered hat down over his eyes.
"He has a point," Alyssia noted, watching Jack from her vantage point in the far corner of the cell. She was seated on the floor, her knees drawn up to her chest. Her sheathed sword lay beside her. The guards who had thrown Jack in an unceremonious heap on the floor of the cell some hours earlier had, naturally, taken no notice of her, much less the fact that she was armed, so she still had her sword. She had debated making a stand on Jack's behalf right then and there, but had ultimately decided against it. She doubted a month of fencing training would keep her alive in a fight against half a dozen marines. So here she was, locked in a cell with an insane pirate in the British version of death row. Terrific.
"Me, or the fellow with the bone?" Jack inquired mildly, lifting the brim of his hat to fix her with a curious gaze.
"The guy with the bone," she clarified. "How ARE you planning on getting out of here?"
"Ah, well, actually, I'm not," he admitted.
"You're WHAT?"
"I don't have a plan for getting out," he said, with the air of one addressing a slow four year old.
Alyssia counted to ten, then said in a forced-calm voice, "You're not going to escape? You're just going to let them hang you?"
"I didn't say that," he admonished, with an infuriating gold-toothed grin.
Alyssia counted to an even higher number, but decided upon reflection against interrogating him further, as he clearly wasn't going to tell her anything.
The prisoner who had spoken earlier piped up again, pressing his face against the bars of the cell to stare, wide-eyed, at Jack. "Who the devil 'r you talking to, then?"
Jack favored him with a predatory smile, and answered wickedly, "Just so, mate. I'm talking to the devil, you're right."
The man gulped and retreated with his cell-mates as far away from Jack as they could get.
Alyssia chuckled. "C'mon, I'm not THAT bad, am I?"
"Far from it, love," he said easily, giving up his attempt at sleeping and sitting up. "Although you've got me a bit confused, really."
Alyssia raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"
"Yeh," he said. "I expected you to bolt first chance you got."
"Why?" Alyssia asked, genuinely curious.
"Ye're only a lass, after all, and I thought perhaps you'd find all this," he waved his hand extravagantly to encompass their surroundings, "To be a bit much for you, savvy?"
"Where else would I go?" she retorted.
"Where else indeed?" he replied, watching her carefully out of half- slitted eyes.
"I'm not crazy, Jack, whatever you may think," she said, answering the unspoken question. "I don't know why I'm here, or how to get back home, or if I even want to try, but I know I'm not crazy."
"Uh huh," he replied. "So, where, or should I say, when you come from, what is the world like?"
"Different," she answered frankly. "A LOT different."
"You're from the year, what, 2003?"
"That's right," she said. "September of that year, actually."
"And," he continued, "In the year 2003, do they still have pirates?"
"Not like you," she said, half-smiling. "Some, in the China Sea, but none in the United States, where I come from."
Jack frowned. "The what? Where's that?"
Alyssia thought back, trying to find a point of comparison. Finally she asked, "Do you know Charles' Town Port?"
"Of course," he said. "Part of the colonies."
"OK," she said, "Well, that whole continent- those colonies -will eventually become independent from England, many years from now. They'll be called the United States of America."
Jack looked somewhat skeptical, but nodded. "And you're what, some kind of minor nobility, judging by the way you talk?"
Alyssia smiled. "We don't have nobility, or commoners, or anything like that in America. We're all equal, with equal rights, and we're governed by elected officials, chosen by the people. We don't have any slaves, either," she added, realizing this might interest him.
He wrinkled his nose in disgust, and said, "So you're an entire country of honest, hard-working, peace-loving people?" He sounded utterly revolted.
Alyssia smirked. "We try. But anyway," she added, "I think we have more immediate concerns on our hands than the morals of a country that doesn't exist yet. Listen!"
The sounds of cannon-fire and explosions echoed from down in the harbor, accompanied by bright flashes of light. Jack leapt lightly to his feet and peered out the narrow window. "I know those guns... It's the Pearl."
The prisoner who had spoken earlier gazed up at Jack through the bars, terror on his unshaven face. "The Black Pearl? I've heard stories. She's been preying on ships and settlements for near ten years. Never leaves any survivors..."
Jack gave him a roguish grin. "No survivors? Then where do the stories come from, I wonder?"
The prisoner frowned as he thought about this, and gave no answer.
Alyssia got up, and joined Jack at the window, her sheathed sword in held in one white-knuckled hand. Together they watched the black shape of the Pearl as she bombarded Port Royal.
*
Alyssia threw herself backwards as the cannonball smashed through the wall of the next cell. The prisoners immediately scrambled out. One of them paused to say apologetically, "My sympathies, friend, you've no manner of luck at all."
Jack and Alyssia stood side by side for a moment, gazing through the bars at the gaping hole in the wall. Alyssia reached through the bars, grabbed the bone the other prisoners had been using to tempt the dog, and handed it to Jack without a word.
The dog was somewhat less than impressed with Jack, and ran away down the corridor, keys still clutched in its mouth.
"You shouldn't have insulted him," Alyssia observed.
Jack was about to reply scathingly when the guard, who up until that point had been at the top of the stairs, came tumbling down the stone steps to land in a heap, clearly dead. Two vicious-looking pirates with absolutely none of Jack's charm stumbled down the steps, and paused at the bottom. One of them growled to the other, "This ain't the armory!"
"No, really?" Alyssia snapped.
The other walked up to the bars of Jack's cell and gazed mockingly at him. He stared insolently back. Alyssia, on the other hand, backed away until she fetched up against the far wall, under the window. The man murmured, "Well, well, well, look what we have here, Twigg- Captain Jack Sparrow."
The man called Twigg spat, and addressed Jack, "Last time I saw you, you were all alone on a godforsaken island, shrinking into the distance. His fortunes aren't improved much."
"Worry about your own fortunes, gentlemen," Jack replied smoothly. "The deepest circle of Hell is reserved for betrayers and mutineers."
The man who had first spoken lunged forward and seized Jack by the throat. Alyssia let out a gasp. His hand had turned to bones as it entered a shaft of moonlight. The skeletal fingers were locked around Jack's neck, but Jack didn't make any move to break free. Alyssia started forward, unsheathing her sword, but the ring on her finger made it PAINFULLY clear that she wasn't to interfere.
Jack spoke. "So there is a curse. That's interesting."
The man released Jack, and said dangerously, "You know nothing of Hell."
He and his companion departed without another word.
Jack remained where he was, gazing thoughtfully after them. That's... very interesting."
Alyssia shivered, and asked after a moment, "Are you all right?"
He gave her a lopsided grin as he turned around, and said, "Of course I am. I'm Captain Jack Sparrow, love." Then he winced and rubbed his neck, coughing a little.
Alyssia nodded, and said agreeably, "Of course you are, and I'm the Queen of Sheba, myself."
He gave a world weary sigh and tipped his head back to expose his throat, saying defiantly, "See? No blood. I'm fine-"
"Apart from the bruise on your throat showing a hand and fingers," she interjected. She grinned wickedly and added, "Now ye know how those poor wenches of yours feel, hm?"
"I like my lovers willing, thank you!" he snapped, with enough fire that she stepped back in surprise.
"Sorry," she said, holding her hands up, palms out. "I meant no offense."
"I know," he said tiredly, gingerly examining the bruise with his fingertips.
The ring on Alyssia's finger gave a flash of light, giving her skin an odd greenish glow- which didn't fade. Feeling as thought she had just looked at a camera flash, she blinked hard several times, and stared at her glowing hand in wonderment.
Jack was also staring at it, with a decidedly uneasy expression on his face. "What, ah, is it doing, exactly?"
"Beats me," she said, holding the ring up in front of her eyes and examining it. On impulse she addressed it directly, saying, "And what might this be about? What do you want me to do?"
The ring gave off another blinding flash, and yet another and another, until it was flickering like an old movie projector. In fact...
A picture grew in the air above the stone set in the ring, or rather, a series of images. First, the cover of one of Alyssia's favorite books, "Lady Knight", by Tamora Pierce. An image of the book's main character, Keladry of Mindelan, sporting her usual black eye appeared next. Then a single printed word, "Nealan".
Alyssia stared blankly as the stone went dark and the last image faded. Her hand continued to glow green. Then she smiled at the ring, and said, "Creative way to explain it, I'll give you that. Good idea."
Jack shook his head as though to clear it, and said weakly, "Dare I ask what that was about?"
"Apparently, this ring is here to tell me when I can interfere and when I can't," she explained, "And right now is one of those times where I can. It's also, ah, helping me along a bit. Lucky for you. Hold still, I've never done this before."
Looking a bit nervous, Jack complied, flinching as she pressed her hand against the bruise, waiting until the last of the green glow faded from her hand. When she took her hand away, the bruise was gone.
Jack swallowed experimentally, and rubbed his throat, grinning. "Cold fingers," he teased.
She rolled her eyes. "Good lord, Sparrow, I just did MAGIC, like in tales, and here you stand complaining about my hands being cold?"
"You didn't do magic, love," he pointed out. "That... ring... did."
"It's like Need, the sword from "By the Sword"," she said, frowning. "Or like one of Tolkien's magic rings, only different. And why it should be mixed up in a pirate story I've no idea. Dead useful, though." She yawned widely. "Well, Sparrow, it's getting late, and I expect we should both try and get some sleep."
He nodded, his dark eyes watching her closely.
She stared uncomfortably right back.
At last he smirked at her and lay down, right in the middle of the dirt floor, taking up as much space as was humanly possible.
"Right," she said grimly, settling back into her corner with her back against the wall. "I'll be over here- WAY over here."
She resolutely closed her eyes, ignoring his quiet laughter.
************************************************************************
A/N: No, I haven't gone crazy- I know what I'm doing here. You guys are just gonna have to trust me on this one.... savvy?
*
"You can keep doing that forever, the dog is never going to come," Jack drawled, watching the efforts of the prisoners in the next cell.
"Oh, excuse us if we haven't resigned ourselves to the gallows just yet!" one of them snapped.
Jack only smiled, leaned back against the wall, and pulled his battered hat down over his eyes.
"He has a point," Alyssia noted, watching Jack from her vantage point in the far corner of the cell. She was seated on the floor, her knees drawn up to her chest. Her sheathed sword lay beside her. The guards who had thrown Jack in an unceremonious heap on the floor of the cell some hours earlier had, naturally, taken no notice of her, much less the fact that she was armed, so she still had her sword. She had debated making a stand on Jack's behalf right then and there, but had ultimately decided against it. She doubted a month of fencing training would keep her alive in a fight against half a dozen marines. So here she was, locked in a cell with an insane pirate in the British version of death row. Terrific.
"Me, or the fellow with the bone?" Jack inquired mildly, lifting the brim of his hat to fix her with a curious gaze.
"The guy with the bone," she clarified. "How ARE you planning on getting out of here?"
"Ah, well, actually, I'm not," he admitted.
"You're WHAT?"
"I don't have a plan for getting out," he said, with the air of one addressing a slow four year old.
Alyssia counted to ten, then said in a forced-calm voice, "You're not going to escape? You're just going to let them hang you?"
"I didn't say that," he admonished, with an infuriating gold-toothed grin.
Alyssia counted to an even higher number, but decided upon reflection against interrogating him further, as he clearly wasn't going to tell her anything.
The prisoner who had spoken earlier piped up again, pressing his face against the bars of the cell to stare, wide-eyed, at Jack. "Who the devil 'r you talking to, then?"
Jack favored him with a predatory smile, and answered wickedly, "Just so, mate. I'm talking to the devil, you're right."
The man gulped and retreated with his cell-mates as far away from Jack as they could get.
Alyssia chuckled. "C'mon, I'm not THAT bad, am I?"
"Far from it, love," he said easily, giving up his attempt at sleeping and sitting up. "Although you've got me a bit confused, really."
Alyssia raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"
"Yeh," he said. "I expected you to bolt first chance you got."
"Why?" Alyssia asked, genuinely curious.
"Ye're only a lass, after all, and I thought perhaps you'd find all this," he waved his hand extravagantly to encompass their surroundings, "To be a bit much for you, savvy?"
"Where else would I go?" she retorted.
"Where else indeed?" he replied, watching her carefully out of half- slitted eyes.
"I'm not crazy, Jack, whatever you may think," she said, answering the unspoken question. "I don't know why I'm here, or how to get back home, or if I even want to try, but I know I'm not crazy."
"Uh huh," he replied. "So, where, or should I say, when you come from, what is the world like?"
"Different," she answered frankly. "A LOT different."
"You're from the year, what, 2003?"
"That's right," she said. "September of that year, actually."
"And," he continued, "In the year 2003, do they still have pirates?"
"Not like you," she said, half-smiling. "Some, in the China Sea, but none in the United States, where I come from."
Jack frowned. "The what? Where's that?"
Alyssia thought back, trying to find a point of comparison. Finally she asked, "Do you know Charles' Town Port?"
"Of course," he said. "Part of the colonies."
"OK," she said, "Well, that whole continent- those colonies -will eventually become independent from England, many years from now. They'll be called the United States of America."
Jack looked somewhat skeptical, but nodded. "And you're what, some kind of minor nobility, judging by the way you talk?"
Alyssia smiled. "We don't have nobility, or commoners, or anything like that in America. We're all equal, with equal rights, and we're governed by elected officials, chosen by the people. We don't have any slaves, either," she added, realizing this might interest him.
He wrinkled his nose in disgust, and said, "So you're an entire country of honest, hard-working, peace-loving people?" He sounded utterly revolted.
Alyssia smirked. "We try. But anyway," she added, "I think we have more immediate concerns on our hands than the morals of a country that doesn't exist yet. Listen!"
The sounds of cannon-fire and explosions echoed from down in the harbor, accompanied by bright flashes of light. Jack leapt lightly to his feet and peered out the narrow window. "I know those guns... It's the Pearl."
The prisoner who had spoken earlier gazed up at Jack through the bars, terror on his unshaven face. "The Black Pearl? I've heard stories. She's been preying on ships and settlements for near ten years. Never leaves any survivors..."
Jack gave him a roguish grin. "No survivors? Then where do the stories come from, I wonder?"
The prisoner frowned as he thought about this, and gave no answer.
Alyssia got up, and joined Jack at the window, her sheathed sword in held in one white-knuckled hand. Together they watched the black shape of the Pearl as she bombarded Port Royal.
*
Alyssia threw herself backwards as the cannonball smashed through the wall of the next cell. The prisoners immediately scrambled out. One of them paused to say apologetically, "My sympathies, friend, you've no manner of luck at all."
Jack and Alyssia stood side by side for a moment, gazing through the bars at the gaping hole in the wall. Alyssia reached through the bars, grabbed the bone the other prisoners had been using to tempt the dog, and handed it to Jack without a word.
The dog was somewhat less than impressed with Jack, and ran away down the corridor, keys still clutched in its mouth.
"You shouldn't have insulted him," Alyssia observed.
Jack was about to reply scathingly when the guard, who up until that point had been at the top of the stairs, came tumbling down the stone steps to land in a heap, clearly dead. Two vicious-looking pirates with absolutely none of Jack's charm stumbled down the steps, and paused at the bottom. One of them growled to the other, "This ain't the armory!"
"No, really?" Alyssia snapped.
The other walked up to the bars of Jack's cell and gazed mockingly at him. He stared insolently back. Alyssia, on the other hand, backed away until she fetched up against the far wall, under the window. The man murmured, "Well, well, well, look what we have here, Twigg- Captain Jack Sparrow."
The man called Twigg spat, and addressed Jack, "Last time I saw you, you were all alone on a godforsaken island, shrinking into the distance. His fortunes aren't improved much."
"Worry about your own fortunes, gentlemen," Jack replied smoothly. "The deepest circle of Hell is reserved for betrayers and mutineers."
The man who had first spoken lunged forward and seized Jack by the throat. Alyssia let out a gasp. His hand had turned to bones as it entered a shaft of moonlight. The skeletal fingers were locked around Jack's neck, but Jack didn't make any move to break free. Alyssia started forward, unsheathing her sword, but the ring on her finger made it PAINFULLY clear that she wasn't to interfere.
Jack spoke. "So there is a curse. That's interesting."
The man released Jack, and said dangerously, "You know nothing of Hell."
He and his companion departed without another word.
Jack remained where he was, gazing thoughtfully after them. That's... very interesting."
Alyssia shivered, and asked after a moment, "Are you all right?"
He gave her a lopsided grin as he turned around, and said, "Of course I am. I'm Captain Jack Sparrow, love." Then he winced and rubbed his neck, coughing a little.
Alyssia nodded, and said agreeably, "Of course you are, and I'm the Queen of Sheba, myself."
He gave a world weary sigh and tipped his head back to expose his throat, saying defiantly, "See? No blood. I'm fine-"
"Apart from the bruise on your throat showing a hand and fingers," she interjected. She grinned wickedly and added, "Now ye know how those poor wenches of yours feel, hm?"
"I like my lovers willing, thank you!" he snapped, with enough fire that she stepped back in surprise.
"Sorry," she said, holding her hands up, palms out. "I meant no offense."
"I know," he said tiredly, gingerly examining the bruise with his fingertips.
The ring on Alyssia's finger gave a flash of light, giving her skin an odd greenish glow- which didn't fade. Feeling as thought she had just looked at a camera flash, she blinked hard several times, and stared at her glowing hand in wonderment.
Jack was also staring at it, with a decidedly uneasy expression on his face. "What, ah, is it doing, exactly?"
"Beats me," she said, holding the ring up in front of her eyes and examining it. On impulse she addressed it directly, saying, "And what might this be about? What do you want me to do?"
The ring gave off another blinding flash, and yet another and another, until it was flickering like an old movie projector. In fact...
A picture grew in the air above the stone set in the ring, or rather, a series of images. First, the cover of one of Alyssia's favorite books, "Lady Knight", by Tamora Pierce. An image of the book's main character, Keladry of Mindelan, sporting her usual black eye appeared next. Then a single printed word, "Nealan".
Alyssia stared blankly as the stone went dark and the last image faded. Her hand continued to glow green. Then she smiled at the ring, and said, "Creative way to explain it, I'll give you that. Good idea."
Jack shook his head as though to clear it, and said weakly, "Dare I ask what that was about?"
"Apparently, this ring is here to tell me when I can interfere and when I can't," she explained, "And right now is one of those times where I can. It's also, ah, helping me along a bit. Lucky for you. Hold still, I've never done this before."
Looking a bit nervous, Jack complied, flinching as she pressed her hand against the bruise, waiting until the last of the green glow faded from her hand. When she took her hand away, the bruise was gone.
Jack swallowed experimentally, and rubbed his throat, grinning. "Cold fingers," he teased.
She rolled her eyes. "Good lord, Sparrow, I just did MAGIC, like in tales, and here you stand complaining about my hands being cold?"
"You didn't do magic, love," he pointed out. "That... ring... did."
"It's like Need, the sword from "By the Sword"," she said, frowning. "Or like one of Tolkien's magic rings, only different. And why it should be mixed up in a pirate story I've no idea. Dead useful, though." She yawned widely. "Well, Sparrow, it's getting late, and I expect we should both try and get some sleep."
He nodded, his dark eyes watching her closely.
She stared uncomfortably right back.
At last he smirked at her and lay down, right in the middle of the dirt floor, taking up as much space as was humanly possible.
"Right," she said grimly, settling back into her corner with her back against the wall. "I'll be over here- WAY over here."
She resolutely closed her eyes, ignoring his quiet laughter.
************************************************************************
A/N: No, I haven't gone crazy- I know what I'm doing here. You guys are just gonna have to trust me on this one.... savvy?