Gibbs squinted into the morning sunshine, trying to calculate how soon they would come up on the storms they could see raging ahead of them. The seas around Cape Horn were notoriously rough, and many men had been lost whilst rounding the Horn. Above him he could hear the men in the rigging shouting across to the crew of the Dragon, exchanging good-natured insults and expletives as they clambered through the ropes.

He glanced over to the deck of the Dragon, his eyes settling on Elizabeth and Marin where they leant against the forecastle. Their faces were serious as they spoke, and he wondered just why the younger lass had insisted on stepping across to speak with her friend only hours before they would hit the Cape Horn storms. Jack was talking with Will, gesturing flamboyantly about one thing or another, but Gibbs was willing to bet a large percentage of his plunder that the captain was only on board the Dragon to keep an eye on his wife.

She'd been a little ratty recently, up early and refusing to talk to anyone until she'd been up to the heads. On more than one occasion, Gibbs had been witness to Jack staggering out from his cabin half-asleep, because when he'd woken, Marin hadn't been there. To tell the truth, the whole crew seemed concerned, worried that something might be ailing the young lass. Only Solomon didn't seem affected, and indeed, the cheerful man had been warning people off bothering her until she was ready to tell them. Tell them what, Gibbs wondered.

'I wonder what they're talking about,' James said, leaning against the railing in front of the first mate.

Gibbs snorted.

'Not fer us to know, sir,' he told the younger man matter-of-factly. 'The captains know what they're doing, I'm sure.'

James laughed quietly, and Gibbs was struck once again by how much younger and more alive the man seemed when he let himself feel as he had begun to. The old sailor had known the cold, distasteful side of the commodore for many years, and could not suppress the surprise with which he greeted each smile and laugh that was drawn from Marin's cousin.

'Not them,' James chuckled. 'I meant the women.'

Gibbs rolled his eyes.

'They talk of things that men ought not to wot of, sir,' he said in a mysterious tone, before shrugging. 'I doubt anyone knows. 'Cept maybe Solomon, and he's not saying.'

James nodded, his eyes on the two women as they talked animatedly about something or other.

'I wish Marin would say something, though,' he muttered. 'I don't like thinking that she's ill and doesn't want to worry us.'

Gibbs sighed.

'Aye, well, it would sit with her well enough,' he agreed. 'But Jack'll have it out of her sooner or later, ye mark me words.'

James smiled suddenly, a retrospective smile that lit up his eyes as his gaze met that of the older sailor.

'Consider them marked,' he said softly.

Gibbs stared at him, trying to work out why the phrase was so familiar. Then it came to him, and he let out a bark of laughter that echoed about the ship. He shook his head cheerfully, glancing across at the Dragon.

'I sometimes wonder what came of the old Invincible,' he said pensively, thinking back to the voyage that had brought himself, James, Elizabeth and Will to the Caribbean.

'Well, of course you would,' James said smartly. 'You jumped ship at Port Smith.'

Gibbs laughed at his former commander's indignant expression.

'I wasn't about to hang around to be pressed and sent back to England, sir,' he protested mildly. 'Happen I like it out here.'

James smirked.

'Why doesn't that surprise me?' he muttered.

Suddenly Harry shouted down from the crow's nest, his cry coming a split second before that of Dugan, who had been assigned the same duty aboard the Dragon.

'Land ho!'

Gibbs shared a grin with Hopkins, both in perfect time with one another as they bawled back to the boys.

'Where away?'

James watched, amused, as Dugan counted to three.

'Four points off the larboard bow!' the two boys shouted back down, this time together.

Sailors hurried to the sides of the ships, squinting into the distance to try and see the land that their youngest crew mates had seen. Sure enough, amid the raging waters that surrounded the Horn, there lay an island, dominated by a volcano that seemed to be blowing its top even as the rain poured onto it.

Gibbs grinned.

'That'd be Tierra del Fuego then,' he said calmly, turning to shout across to the Dragon. 'Cap'n! We be getting close!'

Jack grimaced sarcastically at his roguish first mate, quickly finishing his conversation with Will. The younger man nodded firmly, a smile on his face, and hurried up to take the helm from old Hopkins as Jack called to his wife. James watched as Marin embraced Elizabeth with a relieved grin, and moved to join her husband, letting him swing them both across to the Pearl smoothly.

Boots hit the deck with a thud and the two separated, each to their own tasks. James joined Marin as she clambered up into the rigging, her cheeks flushed as they slid out along the spar. She smiled up at him as they began to unfurl the sails, ready to let the storms carry them to their destination. Below them, the two crews began to sing together, heaving on the ropes in time with one another as they readied themselves.

'Haul on the bowline, Gibbsy boy's a-moaning,' sang out a familiar voice, his laughter lost beneath the crews' answering refrain of, 'Haul on the bowline, the bowline, haul!'

Gibbs' mock growl in response to Solomon's verse was heard even up among the rigging, as was Jack's laughter at his first mate's expression. The song continued regardless, Matthew's mewling cries a descant to the rough voices that filled the air around him. Marin laughed down at them, her lithe fingers flying as she secured the ropes that would otherwise flap in the stiff breeze that whipped about them. Solomon grinned across at the little boy, held close in his mother's arms and drew in another deep breath as the crews' voices died away around him.

'Haul on the bowline, little Turner's bawling!'

'Haul on the bowline, the bowline, haul!'

James leant across his cousin, grasping a handful to sailcloth to loosen it from the end of the spar as he shook it out. He took the opportunity to squeeze her hand gently as they began to slip back to the mast. Marin smiled encouragingly at him, nodding her head as he mouthed an 'are you alright' above the wind whistling about them.

'Haul on the bowline, the bloody ship's a-rolling!'

'Haul on the bowline, the bowline, haul!'

They slid down the ropes to join the men as they heaved at the lines to settle a course for their captain. Solomon balanced perfectly on top of the capstan, dancing an untidy jig as he kept the men at their pace for the hauling. Jack grinned at his wife from the helm, pleased to see her so active after a few days of sickliness. As the lines finally came into place, Solomon bawled out the last of his verses, greeted with the loudest chorus yet.

'Haul on the bowline, it's a far cry to pay day!'

'Haul on the bowline, the bowline, haul!'

A rousing cheer went up from both ships as they drifted apart, each setting themselves up to weather the storms they approached. The seas were growing rough, increasingly violent as the ships plunged forward, spurred on by the wind as it picked up, filling the sails as the men scrambled to prepare themselves for a hard trawl.

Jack obligingly left the helm to Cotton and his parrot, moving down onto the main deck to join his wife and her cousin as they stared across the water to the storms that raged ahead of them. He clapped a hand on James' shoulder, startling the other man with an unrepentant grin.

'Looking forward to the Horn, Jim?' he asked, slipping an arm about Marin as the ship pitched forward again.

James gave him a hard look.

'For the last time, Jack, my name is James,' he said patiently. 'And no, as a matter of fact, I am not looking forward to my next brush with the mariner's bane.'

Jack laughed, exhilarated by the rush of the wind and the crashing of the waves.

'I didn't think you were,' he said. 'Fancy taking the first watch, mate?'

James glanced from the captain to Marin, who seemed to be trying her hardest to stay out of the conversation. He knew both of them had been up all night, though why, nobody knew. But he did know that they needed their captain thinking straight if they were to survive the Horn, and so he nodded firmly.

'Is Gibbs staying for it, too?' he asked, glancing up at where the first mate was holding one of his bizarre conversations with Cotton's parrot.

Jack nodded.

'He won't sleep unless I'm on deck,' he shrugged, yawning slightly.

Marin poked him in the ribs.

'You need to sleep, Jack,' she told him, accepting his affectionate kiss with an unabashed smile.

He grinned down at her, James' presence forgotten.

'Only if you tuck me in,' he insisted, chuckling at her comical consternation.

Marin shook her head laughingly, wrapping her arm about her husband's waist as another swell slammed against the Pearl, rolling her mercilessly onto the next wave. As the captain and his wife staggered unsteadily to the great cabin, James moved to join Solomon where the younger man sat perched on the capstan.

'Cap'n gone for a sleep with his lovely wife, I take it?' the young sailor asked, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively.

From any other man, James would have taken this comment amiss, thinking it an insult to his cousin, but with Solomon the rules could be ignored. The man was fond of Marin, and James, and his comments were more to tease than insult.

'Yes,' the commodore said bluntly, leaning on the capstan to steady himself as the ship began to settle into a rhythm on the heaving ocean. 'Are you taking first watch, or second?'

Solomon grinned, holding up one finger to indicate his answer.

'You know what's wrong with my cousin, don't you?' James asked him suddenly.

The younger man's grin faded slightly as he nodded.

'I can't tell you,' he added. 'It's her business.'

James frowned, intrigued.

'How do you know?'

'My business to know,' Solomon told him. 'I was trained as a physician before I joined the Pearl.'

The naval man's eyes widened in astonishment. If Solomon was a trained physician, why did he choose to live his life as a pirate? He was so surprised that he voiced his question aloud without thinking. The younger man's expression grew troubled.

'I lost everything when my wife's brother was accused of piracy,' he explained. 'We were drawn into the accusations at some point. Martha, my wife, died in the jail, our son with her. When Jack broke me out because one of his crew was sick, I jumped at the chance to leave it all behind.'

James swallowed, feeling inordinately guilty for bringing the subject up at all. But before he could apologise, Solomon had pushed aside his melancholy, his eyes bright with joy at the sound of the ocean once more.

'Don't worry about Marin, James,' he assured his companion. 'She'll be fine.'

He watched as James heaved a sigh of relief.

'It's not serious then?' he asked with a half-smile.

Solomon laughed.

'Oh, it's serious, alright,' he said, slipping past the other man to scramble up into the rigging. 'I personally can't wait until she works it out.'

James stared after him, confused and less than reassured by the younger man's cool assurance of his cousin's serious but not serious illness. Another swell rolled the ship violently, and his worries were shaken from his mind as the automatic reactions of a sailor took over, sending him flailing up into the rigging after the physician. Such thoughts were best left for a quieter time, he decided, biting down an oath as the ship's rolling almost threw him from the rigging. Perhaps dry land would be a better place to ponder such things.

*~*~*

*sniff* I . . . I s-suppose it's a b-bit pointless of me to a-ask you to review, isn't it? *wanders off crying about how everyone hates her*