Mark The Earth With Ruin

Chapter 12

Jack braced himself as the blow tore into Will's flesh. The blacksmith lurched against the chains that held him, his dark eyes squeezed shut, his arms shaking.

"ANNIE PALMER OR WHATEVER YOUR BENIGHTED NAME IS!" roared Jack.

The witch turned to him with an amused smirk as the blacksnake whip struck Will a second time. "Annie will do, this life. You had something you wanted to say, Jack? Beg for your friend, perhaps?" Her lip curled. "So predictable. Go on," she added to Bill, who raised his arm again."

Jack bared his teeth. "Stripe that lad a third time and you might as well kill me, witch, because I'll not be helping you to find the Hand or any other thing on God's earth."

Annie held up a hand and Bill halted. She faced Jack, pursing her lips. "So you know what I want, then."

He gave her a feral smile. "I'm daft, woman, not a fool. I know what you're after. And I know you need me a damned sight more than I have any use for you. So either you let the lad go, or you spill my blood and end this charade."

"Tempting, Jack, believe me." Annie gave a slow nod. "However, what you say holds the ring of truth. Which is a pity, as it spoils my fun. Still, time enough when I've the Hand in my grasp." She sighed. "Take him down."

Edmund stepped forward and released Will from the hook that had held him upright; the blacksmith sagged to his knees, shackles dragging in the dirt. Blood dripped slowly from his chest to the ground.

Annie grabbed a fistful of Jack's matted hair and jerked his head back, forcing him to look up at her, exposing his throat. "You haven't got it all your own way, Sparrow. As it happens, I need young William as well. And I have more hostages of varying sizes just offshore, on the Triton." She released him. "Just so you don't forget which of us holds the upper," she giggled like a grotesque schoolgirl, "Hand."

Jack growled. "Why him?"

She gave him a look that made him not at all comfortable. "Jealous, my Jack? William there is rather a special case. Touched by those beyond the shadow, armored by love that's greater than death… do you know," Annie added conversationally, "I can't even touch his skin, he's so spiritually pure?"

Jack tested his bonds surreptitiously. "I know. Annoying, isn't it? Me, I think purity's overrated."

Annie gazed at him speculatively. "And then there's you," she went on, tapping her chin. "I don't affect you, do I?"

"Aye, you do." He grinned, though it did not reach his dark eyes. "You make me sick, though not quite like Ned and poor Bill there. More of a stomach thing, really."

She glared at him. "Watch your step, Jack Sparrow." Annie narrowed her eyes speculatively. "What I want to know is why."

He widened his eyes. "Why you make me sick? Mostly because you're a hard bint who gets off on torturing my fr —" Nicodemus backhanded Jack across the face, sending him sprawling.

The small, charred bag dangled free from his shirt as Jack picked himself up, testing his teeth with his tongue. Annie bent and grasped the bag, jerking it free of his neck. She eyed Nicodemus, cold fury in her bearing. "Fool! Did it not occur to you to relieve him of this when you brought him to me?" She threw the small charm to the ground and crushed it with her boot.

Annie reached for Jack suddenly, grasping his cheek roughly as he reared back in apprehension. She grimaced, clearly disgusted. "Protected still. But not forever, Jack Sparrow. You'll be mine again."

He snarled at her. "Like hell I will."

Annie laughed. "Yes, I think that's exactly what 'twill be like."

~*~

Maman made a face. "That was one of my best charms, there," she said, clucking as Rose described Annie grinding it to dust. "Ah well. Best she think he be unprotected, maybe."

Rose looked at her doubtfully before returning her gaze to the peristyle. "You mean he's not?"

Maman gave her a snort. "Now what kind of obeah you think I is, make a charm that flies to pieces when it get a little crushed?" She smiled. "For every day Jack wear that charm, he get a day without it. An' he been wearing that now for 'most twenty years. That witch, she got one long wait afore Maman gives up Jack Sparrow to her."

She gave the worried Rose a pat on the shoulder. "You go 'long, now, Rose. You knows what you needs to do. I has things to see to."

Rose stared at her, startled. "But – I don't know how, and – aren't you coming?"

Maman smiled, her white eyes sinking in a mass of wrinkles. "I be where I needs to be when I needs. You figures it out. I has faith in you." The crone paused, then chuckled. "And you tries to have faith in me, eh? That Annie Palmer, she don't know what she messin' with. But she find out." With that the old woman melted eerily into the shadowed forest, leaving a mystified Rose behind her.

"Bloody hell, and just as if I understood anything about it myself. Just once I wish that old woman would speak plainly," the young woman grumbled, and she began to pick her way toward the water.

~*~

The bushes behind him shook slightly. From the cover of a low overhang of shrub, Zaid shot out an arm and dragged forth a really irritated Anamaria. He released her immediately, his expression abject. "I am truly sorry," the giant whispered. "I thought perhaps you were an unfriendly party."

Ana glared at him. "What makes you think I'm not?" She ducked down behind Zaid, peering over his shoulder. "Where's Jack?" For answer Zaid simply pointed to the peristyle. Ana let out a string of hissed curses that caused the huge ex-slave to sit back on his heels and stare at her, clearly impressed. She glared at him again. "What?"

Wisely, Zaid chose not to answer her, instead pulling an astonished Emmy from the same rustling bush into the protection of the larger shrub. The young Englishwoman let out a mild squeak at this peremptory treatment. "We must come up with a plan," he said in his pontifical way.

Emmy nodded, straightening her makeshift clothing. "I agree, though I also think it would be helpful if we had any idea what Annie Palmer is trying to do."

"She trying to take power that don't belong to her," came a fourth whisper, startling the other three into fits. "We gonna stop her."

Ana was the first to recover. "Maman? What the bloo – what the h – what are you doing here?" she panted.

Maman rolled unseeing eyes. "Why does people keep askin' me that? I is here because I needs to be, just like you, child. Now you gonna do what I say or not?" Ana bridled; Maman chuckled. "Not you, child. I knows you will. These others."

Zaid was still in the throes of shock, but Emmy, feeling a bit as though she had to hold up the Norrington name, rallied. Ana seemed to know and trust this weird old woman. "If you can help my brother, of course I'll do whatever you say."

Maman nodded. "Aye then. And you, boy?" Zaid managed a weak nod, still staring at the crone with something akin to horror.

Ana nudged him. "She's blind, fool," the lady pirate hissed. "Say something."

"Oh," Zaid blinked and thought about it. "Who are you, exactly?"

Maman cackled. "Can't say, exactly. You calls me Maman, that's good enough."

Zaid looked warily at Ana and Emmy, receiving an emphatic nod from the former and a shrug from the latter. He sighed. "Why not? This seems to be a night for irrational behavior. Who am I to buck such a trend?" Zaid took Maman's hand, engulfing it in his own ham-sized fist. "What do you wish me to do?"

"Somewhere in that house there be bottles," Maman said. "You has to find them and break them. Break them all."

Ana looked at the old woman for a long time, then let out a shaky breath. "So that's what she's been doing."

"Aye." Maman nodded, turning her eerie gaze toward Emmy. "One thing, child," she added to Ana as the pirate and Zaid began to move away.

"Aye?" Ana waited.

Maman spoke without turning her head. "If you runs into Annie Palmer, don't let her touch him or you both be lost. Him to her and you to death. You got that?"

Ana wrapped her arms around herself, giving Zaid a nervous look. "Aye." They disappeared into the forest, heading toward the house.

"Now," Maman said, taking both Emmy's cold hands in her own, "you needs to be brave, child, if you wants to help your brother."

Emmy nodded. "I'm ready."

The old mambo leaned closer. "Not all the bottles in that house, child. She gonna keep some on her, the better to keep that there Jack and the boy in line. You has to find them, break the one that holds your brother. Free his soul. Then he come back to you."

Emmy stared. "I'm sorry, I don't – bottles?"

"Aye. What you know of vodoun?"

"Almost nothing, I'm afraid." Emmy bit her lip. "Are you saying Annie Palmer has my brother under the control of some voodoo curse? And I must break a bottle of some sort to release him from its effect?"

Maman patted the girl's hand. "I knew you was clever."

~*~

"All right, my girl," muttered Emmy to herself. "If you're so ruddy clever, you can just figure out a way to get on board that ship without getting murdered for your trouble." It was much easier to sneak off a boat than to sneak on one, she thought irritably, peering through the stand of trees near the end of the dock.

She should have quizzed Anamaria about it. Surely the lady pirate would know how to get on board a hostile vessel without detection. Unfortunately, by the time Emmy realized such a thing would be necessary, 'twas too late – Ana and Zaid had gone.

She ducked back a little as the tall black captain of the ship tramped by, followed by Ned and Bill Turner. These last were roughly escorting a bound Jack Sparrow and a shackled and bleeding Will Turner.

The barest possible crew came after that – what her brother would have called a skeleton crew, had he been in any position to do so. The captain – Nicodemus Annie had called him, when ordering him to ready the ship – barked out a few cruel suggestions about ways to pass the time on the voyage to wherever they were bound, suggestions involving the four captives. For Ned and Bill Turner were as much Annie's captives as anyone. Maybe more so.

Emmy's lips tightened. She had to get on that ship. Wherever Annie Palmer was taking Ned and the others, Emmy had to go along until she got her hands on those bottles Maman was talking about. And if Emmy herself doubted that a little broken glass could restore whatever it was that had gone wrong for them all, she refused to acknowledge it. She had to believe – it was all she had to hold on to.

A flash of white below the dock caught her eye; Emmy watched with interest as a slim figure with streaming dark hair shinned up one of the heavy ropes and disappeared into a cannon port.

Emmy gave a nod. A good idea. She looked about cautiously and crept toward the water's edge, swimming quickly along the pilings to where the figure had disappeared. Once she nearly drowned herself when Annie's skirts went swishing by just overhead; but eventually Emmy found herself at the base of the rope. She reached up and began the painful work of hauling herself up. Really, Emmy's skills of fine needlework and watercolors and playing the pianoforte hardly counted toward this sort of task.

But Ned needed her. Emmy set her jaw and wriggled her way into the cannon port, landing with a soft thud next to a scared and astonished Rose. "Hullo," she panted with a friendly nod. "Thought it might be you."

"You – what – " But there was no time for Rose to ask anything as the ship cast off. She and Emmy scrambled to find a place to hide, finally settling behind some supplies in a storeroom off the galley. The Seraph began to move ponderously toward the open sea.