Mark The Earth With Ruin

Chapter 13

Funny thing, time. Tended to draw itself out interminably when you needed it to race and to telescope in on itself just as you were hoping it would spread itself a little thinner.

And the clear and obvious corollary to that bit of philosophy was, Jack had no idea how long they'd been at sea. Maybe it had been a foolish thing to do, but Annie'd given him a bottle of rum and he'd seen no reason to hang back. Wasn't as if he could escape, not while the ship was underway. Furthermore, Annie had said she'd leave young Will be; but as Jack had seen neither hide nor hair of the young blacksmith since being brought on board he'd had no way to judge the truth of that statement. And no way to make her abide by it if she'd chosen to change her mind.

So he'd given Nicodemus the bearings and upended the bottle. Oblivion had its uses.

But now… Jack tipped the bottle over and watched sadly as nothing happened. No hair left of the dog that bit him, and the mangy cur had him by the throat. The witch must have given him homebrewed rotgut, flavored with burnt sugar to fool an innocent pirate. The inside of his mouth tasted as though Port Royal's entire defensive regiment had trooped through it, using his tongue as a bootwiper. And someone had swiped his eyeballs and stuck burrs in their place.

He rested his arms on his knees and his head on his arms, ignoring the clank of shackles as they rattled. So what was it had woken him from his well-earned stupor? Jack wrinkled his brow against the skin of his forearm and tried to think, discovering that the eyeball-thief seemed to have pocketed his brain as well, leaving some sort of cotton wad in its place. With weevils.

The Seraph creaked, and Jack sat bolt upright, regretting the precipitate action almost immediately as his head fell off and rolled away. Well, near enough as made no difference. He shook it judiciously, waggling it from side to side. No, still attached. Rum, hah. Calling that demonic brew rum was like referring to Annie herself as a sweet and blushing virgin, in Jack's considered opinion. Not that he'd a lot of experience with the latter.

And then it came to him that what had wakened him was the sound of the Seraph's anchor dropping into the sea.

~*~

There was an animal being strangled nearby, Jack thought, but he was too busy to investigate, though the sounds were truly horrific. No, wait, that was him, still having a royal sick-up on the sand of the beach of an unnamed, uncharted island. Huzzah.

He had no recollection of being brought ashore, but the evidence was irrefutable. Jack rolled over, vaguely hoping he was rolling generally away from the mess he'd just heaved up and not into it. He did roll into something, though. Jack sorted through the possibilities and came up with boots.

Whose boots, though? That seemed to be a salient question. Jack squinted in the general direction of up. The figure thus silhouetted twisted awkwardly and offered him a hand. No, two, Jack realized. Too many fingers, otherwise. The usual limit was five or so, wasn't it? There had been that whore in Singapore… but Jack felt fairly secure in assuming that this would not be she, even if his mind had turned to mush.

"Are you all right, Jack?"

Jack knew that concern-laden voice. Will Smith. No, no. Will THE smith. Important things, the's. Crucial. He realized his mind was wandering again and screwed his eyes shut, willing himself to focus.

"Poisoned," he said. Tried to say. The expression of absolute incomprehension on Will's face made it clear he had said something more along the lines of "Pooleylooloo". Jack tried again, enunciating clearly. "I've been poisoned, I think."

"Poisoned! Oh, my God!" Will looked about frantically. "What do we do?"

Jack leaned against him heavily, mostly because his knees gave up. "I've been doing it, me old son. Getting it out of my system, as you might say."

"Ugh." The lad clearly caught a whiff, grimacing. "Do you feel any better?"

Jack found himself sliding back toward the ground and clutched at Will with his manacled hands. "Not particularly, no, thanks very much. Where the devil are your arms? They were there a moment ago."

"Oh. They're behind me." A funny thing happened to Will's face then. Jack investigated; closer than he might have given another choice. Will reared back slightly.

"You're smiling," said Jack accusingly. "What's funny, then?"

Will grinned tightly. "You'll know when you see Annie Palmer's face."

Jack belched. "Sorry. Why? What's on her bloody dial?"

"Handprints." There was that tight smile again. "My handprints. Burned there."

"Oh aye?" Jack processed that, and nodded. "Wish I'd seen that." He looked around blearily. Ned and Bill stood guard over them a short distance away, their blank stares unwavering. "So where is our fair hostess?"

That got an actual chuckle. "Nicodemus has gone back for her. I seem to worry her; she decided not to chance close quarters in an open boat."

"Ah, lad," said Jack sentimentally, "I knew you'd learned something of pirate ways from me. I'm proud of you, and not ashamed to say it."

Will gave him a nudge. "Shut up, Jack," he said affectionately. At least Jack chose to believe it was with affection. "How did she manage to poison you, anyway?"

There was a bit of a stickler. "I – um – she – er – well…"

"Well what?"

Jack sent him a darkling look from under lowered brows. "She said it was rum, all right?"

Will stared. "She – you mean Annie Palmer gave you something, told you it was rum, and you just drank it? How much did you have?"

"The whole bottle," Jack muttered resentfully.

"The whole bottle."

"Aye, the whole bottle."

"For God's sake, Jack, the whole bottle?"

"Yes, damn your eyes, the whole bleeding bottle!" hollered Jack, and promptly fell over backwards. "You weren't holding up your end of doing stupid things, so I decided to step in for you! Fair enough?"

Again Will twisted to offer him a hand up. "Fair enough, Jack," was all the blacksmith said.

Jack leaned against his friend, taking stock of his surroundings. He was feeling better, now he thought about it, though his legs were still having trouble connecting to his brain. Sure enough, coming into shore was a small craft from the Seraph, Annie Palmer aboard.

"I'll tell you the truth, lad," Jack said, keeping his voice low. "I've no clear idea how we're going to get out of this one." Strangely enough, that seemed to amuse Will. "You've an odd idea of a jest, boy."

"You mean there's no 'I'm Captain Jack Sparrow, savvy?' in the immediate offing?" Will chuckled.

Jack thought about that, and told him the unvarnished truth. "Captain Jack Sparrow clipped his wings seven years ago when I took that letter of marque so you'd not have to see me hang. He died for much the same reason." Jack sighed. "Now I've been Lord John Finch so long I'm not sure if Captain Jack Sparrow exists anymore." He shook his head in disgust. "Look at the stupid rum thing."

Oops. Jack had half forgotten he had an audience. Will stared at him. "You – that was for me?"

The pirate slumped. "Aye, lad, for you and wee Lizbet. Never meant you should know, but Annie Palmer's demon brew seems to've loosened my tongue." He shrugged. "Well, I couldn't put you through more grief, could I?" Will continued to stare. "Stop looking at me like a slackjawed idiot, boy. You're drawing flies."

Will shut his mouth with a snap. "When we get out of this, you and I are going to have a talk about unwanted sacrifices."

Jack snorted. "When we – you're as cocky as ever I was, Will."

"Not at all. The truth is, you're still Captain Jack Sparrow."

"For all the good it does."

Will grinned and ducked his head to whisper. "And the Seraph had at least one stowaway… " He broke off as Annie got out of the boat with Nicodemus, the latter stalking toward them.

~*~

"How much longer?" Emmy's voice was a raspy whisper.

Rose pressed her eye to the crack in the hull of the Seraph. "Not long. The sun is beginning to set; it'll be dark enough soon," she whispered back.

Emmy nodded. "It's been an hour, just about." She glanced up at the round circle of light filtering through the knothole Rose had poked away.

They'd realized Will was being held in the cabin above early the day before, when they heard Annie Palmer screaming epithets at him right over their heads. Rose had waited, balancing on Emmy's shoulders, until she was sure he was alone; then she had carefully pried at a knothole in the planking separating them, using a tarnished knife they'd found on the storeroom floor. Luck was with them; Emmy, being taller and therefore closer to the knothole once Rose had finished her work, had managed a few hurried whispers, telling Will that his daughter was safe, before someone had come in to guard him. And that had been, unfortunately, that.

Until they'd taken Will away, just about an hour ago. He'd argued, protested, taunted, cleverly gleaning information from the captain, Nicodemus, whose basso profundo tones carried well through the deck planking. So now they knew that whatever Annie Palmer was going to do, she was going to do at midnight. Roughly six hours to stop her. And one of them was already gone.

Emmy could make out Rose looking at her in the shifting shadows of the empty galley storeroom. "We can do this," she said, trying to sound reassuring.

Rose nodded. "There's still so much we don't know. Do you think she left the bottles on board?"

"No." Emmy shook her head decisively. "If I were holding captive souls, I'd make certain of them, not leave them to chance. What if the ship rolled and one of them got smashed? She has them with her."

"Aye." Rose nodded again. "Emmy…"

"Yes?"

"What would make a man who wanted to die choose to live?"

Emmy thought about that. "I don't know. Instinct, I expect."

Rose sat forward, her chin on her knees. "What sort of instinct?"

"Oh, the usual ones. Self preservation, protect your loved ones, that sort of thing." Emmy stretched her neck this way and that, trying to work out the kinks. "Why?"

But Rose had fallen into a brown study and made no answer.