A/N- Chapter seven, yeah I ran out of title ideas, oh man, my brain is swamped, I went to visit Augsburg and it's all locked up like a prison…I'm not sure if they're trying to keep people in or keep dangers out- I'm being sent to a prison- a well-to-do prison I'll bet, but a prison all the same. Wanna know a good movie with the sexiest man alive in it? The Astronaut's Wife- Johnny Depp plays this astronaut named Spencer that goes into space and comes back all wrong…sexy, but wrong. Charlize Theron plays his wife- but Johnny Depp is God, he's blond in this movie, but still really, really, really sexy…
Chapter Seven: The Red Roiben.
Starr had been beating her brain trying, failing, but trying- to figure out what she could've done to set The Rogue against her, Bram had only been a boy of eight…what could he have done to upset The Rogue so? Starr herself was only thirty-six, not so young anymore, but not so old to warrant her demise…The Rogue was older than her by far; at his last birthday The Rogue had breached and broken the living age of most thieves by reaching an astounding sixty-five, and Starr had thought at one time that thirty was a miracle age…
She realized now, of course, that she was only alive for The Rogue's entertainment.
Why Bram? Why had The Rogue not come for her, why had he sent his men instead to abolish a tiny spit of a boy that had only begun to live…. Starr bit her tongue and let the bitter, rusty taste of blood flood her mouth.
Jack entered the cabin and came at once to her side: "You're afraid of him?" biting back a wicked laugh, she let her resentful green pools meet his black orbs, her voice hollow and detached: "Afraid of him? No, I'm not afraid, I'm terrified," Jack sidled down next to her and placed his arm casually around her shoulder, she met his eyes again with a look that could spoil venom- Jack did not pull away, and instead pulled Starr closer. "Jack, ye've never seen the Roiben, ye've never passed through it's halls an seen the blood pouring down it's walls like rain, ye've never been apart of the seedy dark that is the Roiben…
"sure ye've heard the tales, ye've heard all the glitz an the glamour…but ye've never seen the dark," a tear slipped out the corner of her left eye and traced it's way down her scar, Jack's thumb joined the tear- leaning down he ran his tongue over her lips, feathering the lightest of kisses over her knew scar.
"You know," he whispered, "I've my own share of scars, and I think your scar gives you just the right amount of air for trouble…" he ended his sentiment with a debonair smirk and kissed Starr fitfully on the mouth.
"I can't bring meself to go there Jack, knowing what I now know…"
"You can go in there, love, what you can't do is take on all the Roiben by your onesy."
"Then what do ye suggest, cause I'm all out of ideas."
He leaned in and whispered something secretively into her ear, a smile spread lazily across her face and she pulled him down to her, their lips clashed and folded against one another, hands, and mouths were soon everywhere, undistinguishable between whether the part belonged to Starr or Jack…
"You say that she knows…" the cold voice spoke up from the shadows, daring the boy to speak further, "Yes, yer grace, she knows-"
"Did she say she knows?"
"N-no…she says dat…dat… 'tell Da Rogue dat 'is bird still wives, tell 'im dat if 'e wants me dead 'e knows where ta find me, but before dat- tell 'im I'd like an esplenation ta why 'e killed me brother…'" the boy trailed off, dread washing over his entire body, "'S all she says, yer grace, all she tole me ta tell ye, an I membered it…I didin forget none of it, not one bit."
Beckoning to the boy through the shadows, The Rogue's arm slashed out and pulled the now quaking boy to him-
"Your idiocy out does you…I told you to kill her, did I or did I not make myself very clear on that matter?"
"Oh inescapably clear, Majezty- but she's not like most o' yer poppets…ye be wanting me ta find her ta give a message back?"
"No," the voice struck out like a flash of lightning, "I'll handle her- seeing as I could not trust you to handle the little problem on your own…" The Rogue sat back, releasing the boy back to the light.
"Yer grace?" the boy questioned cautiously.
"Leave now," a cold smile touched his lips, reaching briefly to his eyes, "I may yet change my mind on punishing you." the boy scampered off, leaving the Roiben 's enigmatic court behind him. Kamarrato approached the black throne with careful steps, his voice full of dark disgust:
"Ye were the one that killed Bram?- and then I heard that ye tried to do off wiv Starr…Sire, the very trying of that 'tis blasphemy, Starr never did nuffing to ye, why would ye kill her?"
The Rogue leaned out of the shadows, his eyes sparkling with fury, "Kamarrato Purloin, are you mutinying against my word?" he smiled cheekily and patted Kam on the cheek, "Starr betrayed us, she's gone off with a pirate- we cannot allow that now can we?" Kam threw down his rapier at The Rogue's feet, his eyes flashing with contempt, "I would serve ye, my liege, I would serve ye if ye were out ta do any other deed but Starr, I will not kill her, nay- I am for her, I em no longer at yer call, I'm gone." with that Kam turned on his heel and stormed out of The Red Roiben.
The Rogue motioned to a cloaked figure at his right, one of his ever diligent guards, a man by the name of Silver Rife- "Kill him," Silver went to follow Kam out into the streets, but The Rogue held a hand to stop him, "On second thought…kill him slowly, make sure he screams."
Silver let a cruel smile drop over his features, drawing a dagger from the sleeve of his cloak, he followed Kam out onto the busy Port Royal streets…a short while later a scream shattered the bustling quiet of the streets, Silver did not return. The Rogue motioned to his top assassin, Night Black-
"Find Kamarrato and bring me his head- do not return to me until you are sure he is gone, when he is…find the pirate and destroy him, leave Starr Auroras to me."
Night nodded curtly and disappeared in a rustling of fabric, he would not fail The Rogue, if he did, The Rogue would kill him…unless Kamarrato had already done so.
A/N- The Rogue I created is an asshole…he isn't so harsh in my Auroras series…. Oh well, I like him mean. yeah I'm just interrupting my story to waste time, I'm supposed to be looking up something for more colleges (sarcastic YAY!) leave me alone, I'm gonna crawl into a small, dark hole and cry a river…well maybe not a river, but I'm still crawling into a hole…. Please tell me what you think, oh and back to the story.
They crept toward the warehouse that held the lodgings of the Roiben with severe caution, Starr holding her breath, had a vice-like grip on Jack's hand, turning to meet his eyes, now hooded and foggy with wonder. Starr kissed him lightly before ducking through the shallow hole that made the back door of The Red Roiben's warren.
Once inside, the air itself seemed bittersweet and to breath it in was disorientating.
Long, low tables were heaped with gold, silver, rubies, and emeralds shattered by the force of a hammer. Crystal goblets sat like toads on the tables, upright and overturned in equal proportion. Scarlet-clad prostitutes brushed past men in torn rags, and courtiers danced with fools.
Drunken revelers danced and sang, drank and swooned. The costumes were varied and completely unlike clothing seen elsewhere. They were more like some demented couture. Collars rose like great fins. Outfits were composed entirely of metal or shells. Ragged edges finished off lovely dresses. Ugly, strange, or as terrifying as Satan's mistress- none were plain.
Starr whispered darkly into Jack's ear: "Jack Sparrow, welcome to The Red Roiben." noting the look on Jack's face, Starr realized he had expected something else, a cave, maybe filled with human bones and prisoners. Something simple. Noting as extravagant as this. Looking through the crowd of revelers, Starr didn't know what to think herself.
The room itself was massive, so large that Starr didn't even know what was on the other side. Far across the room, what looked like a giant slouched near a dais. Each step seemed to push her away from Jack, a fiddler was playing an improbable instrument with several necks and so many strings that the fiddler sawed his bone at them wildly. A long nosed woman with freckles and ears like a troll's juggled apples. Three men with soot covered faces, dipped mugs into deep vats of ale. A huge man with a cloak that looked like batwings sat atop a table and lapped beer from a boot, he leered at Starr as she went past.
Above them all, the ceiling domed into an arch frescoed with darts and bullet dents.
Starr picked a goblet off a table and slipped it carelessly into the leather satchel always at her side, Jack saw this and jerked his head pointedly back at the table as if to say: 'put it back, we aren't here to steal', Starr grinned and grabbed another, draining the sweetly bitter fluid within it before dropping it into the bag. She spotted a tray of strange, thorny fruit and gingerly palmed one before pocketing it.
She felt an infectious giddiness wash over her, she was home. Here nothing she did was strange. She could pillage and steal and lie to her heart's content.
All at once she was aware of how far away she had drifted from Jack. She had been pushed and turned around so many times she no longer knew which way to take back.
She deliberately tried to retrace her steps. Three women walked past her, the outfits they weren't wearing trailing behind them like fine mist, one woman stopped to give her a very lecherous look before moving on. A short man with intricate silver bracelets and shoulder-length black curls sneered at her as he bit into an apricot.
Every moment Starr felt more of her soul being lost to the glamour.
A cheeky urchin ran up to her, grinning.
"You smell like salt," he said, reaching out a finger to poke her side. Starr stepped away from him, the boy laughed and skipped on. She pushed through the crowd , weaving past dancers leaping in complex intertwining circles, past a gnarled hand that snatched at her from beneath a heavy, woolen cloak, past a heated argument of which the boys held loaded pistols.
A colossal man with a curly beard was hunched over, carefully cutting the fingers off a small girl trapped in his meaty fist. The girl screeched, beating at him with her free hand, thick red blood dribbled over the beast-man's hand. Starr stopped, sickened to watch as the man tossed the girl to the ground and crushed her neck beneath his boot.
He looked up and met her eyes, leering as Starr tried to keep her stomach at bay. She pushed back through the crowd, trying to find Jack in all the madness.
This was her Red Roiben, this was what she had spent all her life in…the worst of the worst came to drink themselves sick, the bravest of the bold held roulettes in the front hall.
One skinny man drew out a dagger and gently ran the sharp edge down a mulatto boy's cheek, Starr approached the man, her voice commanding, "Let him go."
"Ye reawey fink ye're gon' save 'im poppet?"
Her demeanor unflinching: "Let him go."
The man chuckled, "I'm not gon' kiwl 'im," he let the dagger bite down into the boy's flesh, the boy whimpered and Starr took a step forward, "I'm jes soften' 'im up a bit…"
Fury surged up in her. Pulling her rapier from it's sheath, Starr lunged at the man, pinning him between her blade and the wall he had his back to, taunting him, her voice sugar-coated: "Now will you let him go?"
"Yeah," he croaked, "Yeah. I'll let 'im go…"
Satisfied that he would harm the boy no longer, Starr pushed her way back into the crowd. She came to a sudden halt …half hidden by three siren type women with large busts and ample waits- was Jack.
He was edged between an overturned table, a gem encrusted goblet tipped in his hand. He was singing merrily with his eyes closed, rocking back and forth. A puddle of wine soaked his shirt, but he didn't seem to care.
Revelers were packed in tightly around her, so she scuttled under a table. "Jack?" Starr said, breathing hard. He was looking right at her and at the same time not seeing her at all.
She shook him.
He noticed that and finally glanced up. He was drunk, or worse than drunk- like he'd been drunk for years and then drugged.
"Starr, 'like ye t' meet me friends-" his words slurred as he waved his arms acknowledging the three women who were now glaring at Starr in dangerous recognition.
"We've met." she said curtly, pulling Jack to his feet.
"I saw 'im." Jack said randomly.
"Saw who?"
""Rogue 'o yers…"
Starr felt her heart harden, "Did you."
"Yeah…seems to like all this glory shtuff,"
Starr's eyebrow quirked and she murmured cautiously: "He would, it's 'is style, he never has been one to take things lightly or back down from glorifying som'fing…even glorifies death…" Starr noticed something in Jack's eyes and turned around, the black throne was as it always was…but without a king to fill it, where was The Rogue?
The crowd parted and that was answered.
He was perfection. He was tall, with a thin, well tapered waist. Long, silver hair fell to his shoulders, tied back and braided, a few strands falling loosely into his face. Deep-set, intelligent, steel-gray eyes loomed out of a barely aged face, he had never looked his age, always younger.
"Starr, should I welcome you home, or are you by chance here for any reason but the liberties the Roiben can offer?"
"Graemae," she growled softly, "You and I need to talk, we need to talk about Bram and why ye killed him, we need to talk about how ye could've taken his innocent life, knowing that I would come fer ye," she stepped towards him, "but most of all, I'd like to know why ye tried to kill me."
Graemae Cooper, known around the Keys simply as "The Rogue", let a cold hard, smile slip across his lush mouth, "Starr, that by now should be all to obvious."
"Well it's not."
He leaned in, his lips grazing the top of her ear, "Starr, if I cannot have you, I'm not going to let some seafaring drunk take my place. You see, I had to kill Bram to get you to hate him," he jerked his head at Jack, "that didn't work as planned, even away from him you were always lost in memory or daydream- and now…you're back with him, and you know the truth," his eyes dropped and a mockingly sad pout dropped it's way onto his mouth, "You've left me no other choice than to kill you and him both."
Starr grabbed a pistol from her satchel, her eyes blacker than any sea with a limey, green tint lounging in the background almost like a shadow, held a challenge, "Then kill me," she laughed as Graemae's eyes widened in fear at his mistake. "Oh good, so ye do remember that I have never missed a shot."
"You won't live through this Starr, you're already dying."
"No, Majesty, it's you who are dying." with that, Starr cocked the pistol and took aim.
A/N- Another cliffhanger, I'm waiting for someone to kill me. I'm sorry for this cliffhanger, but I didn't want them to actually fight in this chapter, that happens next chapter I promise- so I stopped there, thanks for the reviews, keep them coming, if I get at least 26, I'm posting the next chapter.