To my lovely reviewers: Thanks you guys! You rock! Sorry there aren't any special mentions this chapter, I am in kind of a hurry. But thank you all and hope you like this chapter. God it was fun to write... ugh, Elizabeth Swann annoys me...!

The very minute Norrington disappears from view, Elizabeth seizes me by the arm and drags me up the grand staircase to a large bedchamber.

"You shall sleep here," she announces. "My room is next door. Yours is smaller than mine, but I expect you're used to small rooms; after all, your cabin on the Interceptor is hardly as big as our broom cupboard, is it?"

I stare, open-mouthed, at her blatant rudeness, but she either does not notice or does not care. She is bustling around her room, collecting various beautifying implements and hair-brushes, then she makes me sit down at her dressing-table.

"I shall style your hair," she says proudly, and begins tugging at my curls with one of the brushes. "Honestly, your hair is so thick, Catherine," she complains. "I don't know how you can stand it. And such a colour! Red hair should be outlawed. If I were you, I'd have cut it all off by now."

"I like my hair," I say, and fail to stop myself from sounding like a sulky toddler.

"Well, I'll show you some different styles, and you can decide how you want it for tomorrow's ceremony," Elizabeth says. I want to shout at her. What I want to say is: I don't want my hair styled, especially not by you! I don't even want to go to this stupid ceremony, because it will break my heart to see Will married! All I want is to be left alone! I want to take a ship and sail it off to some faraway country where nobody knows my name, and nobody shouts at me, and NOBODY STYLES MY HAIR WHEN I DON'T WANT THEM TO!

However, my mouth has other ideas, and all that comes out is, "If you like."

Elizabeth struggles with my hair for several hours, tugging it into a pony-tail or scraping sections back, but nothing seems to please her, and she admits defeat at around half past eleven, at around which time her father comes in to check on her.

"Ah, hello, Catherine," he says on seeing me. "Norrington did mention that you might stay for a while. How long was it this time?" but he sounds more interested that exasperated, like any normal adult would be when their friend's foster daughter is constantly dumped on them for long periods of time.

"Six months, Father," Elizabeth butts in, before I even have a chance to open my mouth.

"Well, well," he chuckles, "that is a long time. Where's your old father off to now, then?"

"How should I know?" I snap with surprising venom. "And he is not my father."

Both Elizabeth and her father look suitably taken aback. I am breathing hard for some reason. I can't look either of them in the eye. I came very close there to revealing my real hatred for them both, something I had vowed never to do.

"Sorry," I apologise. "I am tired."

"Well, of course," the governor agrees. "I'll let you girls get off to bed, then." He retreats from the room.

"Don't you hate the fact," Elizabeth purrs suddenly, "that your foster father is the man that had your parents hanged? Don't you hate him?"

Of course I do, but I am not about to admit that to her. "It's alright, actually," I reply, defending Norrington for some reason.

She looks surprised. She gets up from the bed and throws a bucket of water on the fire, so the embers glow and the only light in the room comes from candles. She picks up one of these candles and holds it close beneath her chin, so eerie shadows are cast on her face and neck. Thunder booms from outside.

"Do you believe in superstition, Catherine?" she asks.

"No," I lie. I am possibly the most superstitious person ever to walk the earth. You name an old wives' tale, I know it off by heart.

She ignores me. "When the clock chimes midnight, we shall look into the mirror and we shall see our futures."

I say nothing. Looking into a mirror by candlelight is very bad luck.

Elizabeth walks to her grandfather clock and peers at it. "Three minutes to go," she announces. "I shall go first. I shall foretell your fortune."

She sits at her dresser, so still I could swear that time has frozen. I feel slightly shaky about this. I have always been told that midnight is the time when evil spirits fly into the body and cause the person to do things they would not normally do. I do not want to bear witness to Elizabeth flying into a frenzy and tearing the room apart, but I don't know what to say to deter her, so I sit on the bed and do nothing. Lightning flashes from outside. I hear banging on the door downstairs.

Midnight comes, and the clock chimes. A strange chill runs through my body. Elizabeth holds up the candle and looks gravely into the mirror.

"I am seeing..." she whispers. "I am seeing, Catherine! I can see you in twenty years' time, perhaps thirty... you are old, and haggard looking..."

I tense with anger. I see the corners of Elizabeth's lips turn upwards into a smile. She is not seeing my future – she is making this up as she goes along! Outside Elizabeth's door, I hear men shouting and roaring...but that could just be my imagination...

"I see you watching Will and I... we are still happily married... but you are not. You are a spinster, Catherine; you are jealous of me! And you will never marry; I can see it here!"

"You lying little witch!" I shriek suddenly. She laughs outright. She knows exactly what she is doing.

"Always alone, poor Catherine... no man will ever love you..."

The clock chimes its last stroke and I scream. I convince myself I can feel evil spirits rushing through my body, persuading me to do what I want to do. No... I must stop myself...

A colossal roar of thunder issues from the sky and a blinding flash of lightning floods the room. I am gone; I rise from the bed and snatch a sword from the crest over the mantelpiece, then advance on Elizabeth. She screams and drops the candle. It lands on the rug and starts smouldering. I raise the sword to cut her from head to toe, but she ducks out of the way and runs out onto her balcony, shrieking.

I follow, intent on killing her – this girl who has tormented and teased me since the day we met, always boasting and showing off, always putting me down – I hate her, I hate her!

The rain is coming down in sheets. The floor of the balcony is wet and slippery. She is cowering, trembling with fear and cold. I advance on her and she stumbles backwards. She clambers onto the rail of the balcony and attempts to leap to the roof for safety.

I see what is going to happen before she does... she jumps for the roof, but her foot slides on the dripping metal and she slips... she falls, screaming a blood-chilling scream... she tumbles in her white wedding dress and falls from the balcony, plummeting down to the bushes below.

Ooh. Cliffie.

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