Chapter 2

The market of Port Royal was a busy place. The merchants were shouting about prices and offers as they were trying to sell as much as possible.

Women were buying fruit and vegetables and were talking to each other, spreading the latest gossip while their children were playing and chasing each other across the marketplace.

But all the conversation and noise seemed to die down as the people turned around to stare when Elizabeth Turner came to buy the necessary things for living.

Elizabeth felt the stares of the gossiping women in her back as she walked by. But she had got used to all the whispering and staring. She had turned down the Commodore and had married her true love. Will Turner, a blacksmith and descendent of "Bootstrap Bill" Turner, a pirate.

Will and Elizabeth had got married two weeks after they had helped the infamous Captain Jack Sparrow escape the noose in Port Royal. Elizabeth's father, the governor of Port Royal hadn't been too pleased with his daughter's choice but he had given them his blessing all the same. He had even bought them a small house by the seaside.

Despite all the stares and the whispering people whenever she left the house, Elizabeth didn't regret a thing about having married Will.

Will still worked as a blacksmith. today he had to make a delivery to the Commodores office and he was certainly not looking forward to it. Ever since the day of the wedding, the Commodore had taken to showing Will in any way he could, that he belonged to a lower class.

Will knocked on the door of Commodore Norrington's office. After the Commodores voice from inside had told him to enter, Will took a deep breath, opened the door and stepped into the small office.

"Good morning Mr Turner." the Commodore said without looking up from the documents he was studying.

"Good morning Mr Commodore, Sir." Will replied, feeling uneasy.

"I have your orders. Three swords with ebony handles. Perfectly balanced"

Will took one of the sword out of it's box and placed it on the Commodores desk.

The Commodore stood up, took the sword and looked at it closely.

"Excellent work, Mr Turner." he said, still not looking at Will. He put the sword back into it's box and closed the lid. Then, for the first time that morning he looked at Will. But his look wasn't at all friendly.

"I hope aren't spending too much time with your work, though, Mr Turner. You are now married and have quite a responsibility. You'd better look after Elizabeth well." the Commodore said with a serious expression on his face. "Because I wouldn't be very pleased to hear any complaints about you. Remember, I can still get you into trouble."

With these words the Commodore made a dismissive gesture towards Will which told him that he'd better go.

Back in Tortuga Jack was searching the town for Mr Gibbs and found him sleeping soundly in the backyard of a tavern.

Jack grabbed a bucket of water that was standing nearby and emptied the very cold liquid into Gibbs's face.

Only after uttering a few curses Gibbs realised what or, rather who had had woken him up.

"Good morning, Gibbs." Jack said with a wide grin on his face. "Go and find the crew. Tell them to make sure that they're all at the pier tonight. In the meantime I will make some inquiries." Jack turned on his heel and disappeared around the corner, leaving Mr Gibbs to carry out his task.

When Will got home it was just beginning to get dark. He entered the house and found Elizabeth sitting in the living room reading a book. Sitting down next to his wife, Will gave her a gentle kiss.

"God evening love. How was your day?" he asked her.

"It was ok. I went shopping so I'm going to cook something to night.

How was your day?" she asked him in return.

"Quite normal. Except, I had to make a delivery to the commodore."

"I bet he was his usual charming self" Elizabeth said with a touch of sarcasm in her voice.

Will was now standing at the window absentmindedly staring out at the sea, watching the last of the sun disappear behind the horizon.

After a few minutes of silence Elizabeth went to stand behind Will and wrapped her arms around his waist, resting her head on his back.

"You miss being out at sea, don't you?" she asked him.

Will turned around to face Elizabeth.

"Yes I do... a little." he answered, his eyes downcast as if guilty.

"But just now I was actually wondering what Jack might be up to at the moment."

"Wherever he is and whatever he's doing, I'm sure he's alright." Elizabeth said reassuringly. "You know, he's Captain Jack Sparrow after all."

Will chuckled and turned to smile at his wife.

Elizabeth laid a hand on Will's shoulder and said "Now, I'll go and get dinner ready and you can freshen up a bit."

She disappeared into the kitchen and soon Will could hear the clattering of pots, pans and plates. When he walked past the ajar kitchen door Will could hear Elizabeth hum the tune of ' a pirate's life for me' and he felt, like so often, very grateful for having her.

Jack had found out quite a lot during the day. He had gone back to the tavern where he had been the night before to find out to which ship the sailors, who had talked about the treasure, belonged.

He learned that their ship was the H.M.S. Arienne and that she had left port that morning.

The bartender could also tell Jack that one of the sailors had left with a woman the night before.

It didn't take Jack very long to find said woman and being Jack Sparrow, he didn't have much trouble making her tell him all she knew.

Seemingly, the sailor had become quite talkative after a few drinks and had told her about half of his life and loads of unimportant things, in her opinion. Jack of course hadn't told her that some of the information was quite important to him. And so the wench told him freely that the sailor was going on about some important document that was supposed to be transported to England after the very rich and important owner, Maxwell Johnson, had passed away recently.

The H.M.S. Arienne herself was to be the ship to sail to England and would be guarded very heavily by a great fleet and some of the best soldiers the british navy could provide.

Now the next thing Jack had to deal with was to find out which course the Arienne would be taking and where the best place to waylay her would be.

But he would worry about that after having talked to his crew.