Chapter 2

Will finished pounding the metal straight and wiped his forehead on his sleeve. Hanging his hammer in its place, he turned back to Blackbird, who had been sitting on a barrel waiting on him.

"Finally done?" she asked.

"Yeah, just a minute…Ghost!" he called out. After a few minutes, the young man emerged out of the back room. "I want you to finish up this order before you leave, and then you're free to go. I have some business to attend to on my way home."

"Aye, sir," Ghost replied, smiling enthusiastically. Will found that he couldn't help but smile back. The boy still had the same zeal he'd had the first day Will had taken him on as an apprentice. Grabbing his hat, he motioned to Blackbird and followed her out the door.

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"So Jack said he'd meet us at my house, right?" Will asked as soon as they were on the street.

Blackbird nodded. "Last time we spoke, that's what he said," she replied. "But then again, you never know with Jack. Not to worry though, Marie and I will do just fine on our own if he doesn't."

Will laughed. "I hate to say this, but somehow I think Elizabeth trusts Jack with her child more than you. Of course, she won't let him watch her on his own either…Maybe she's hoping that the two of you together might be enough to be the equivalent of one sane adult."

"I resent that remark!" Blackbird exclaimed, feigning a hurt. "I know you love her, Will, but I swear that woman hates me. Does she even know that I'm taking care of Marie while the two of you are out?"

"Well, considering that she doesn't even know we're going out yet, I doubt it," he replied, stopping momentarily to grab some flowers off of an unwatched stand. "Anyway, what she doesn't know can't hurt me." After a few minutes of silence, Will spoke up again. "I really do appreciate you watching Marie tonight, Blackbird. Elizabeth and I haven't had a night alone in ages."

Blackbird arched an eyebrow at him. "And whose fault would that be, mate?" she asked mildly.

"Not you too…" Will groaned.

"Hey, I'm just saying," Blackbird said defensively. "You could spend a little less time at the tavern and a little more with your family."

Will sighed. "How pathetic is this that I'm receiving relationship advice from my sister, who, might I add, has never even been in a serious relationship herself? I can handle this. It's just a matter of…Blackbird?" he asked suddenly. When she didn't say anything, he followed her gaze to his house. The door had been kicked in and one of the windows had been forced open. Numbly, he stepped inside and looked around at the disarray. Most of the furniture has been turned over and the curtains slashed. Broken dishes in the kitchen showed obvious signs of struggle.

"Elizabeth!" he called out. "Marie!" He heard a sound like someone crying coming from the loft upstairs. Hurriedly, he climbed up the ladder and came back down with his crying daughter in his arms. "Marie!" he exclaimed, kissing her forehead in relief. "What happened here?"

The girl cried for several minutes before she could speak. "Th-they took her!" she screamed hysterically. "They took Mama!"

"Shh…" Will whispered soothingly, stroking her dark hair. "It's going to be alright…just take deep breaths…it's going to be alright…" After a few minutes, she seemed to calm down a bit. Keeping himself at her level, Will looked her straight in the eyes. "Now," he said quietly, "I need you to tell me what happened."

Still sobbing gently, Marie tried to explain. "I-I was helping Mama cook dinner," she started haltingly. "Someone knocked at the door, but Mama wouldn't answer it, so they kicked it down. Sh-she told me to get upstairs as fast as I could and not to look back. One of the men hit her on the back of the head, then carried her away…I wanted to stop them, Daddy, but I was so scared!" At that, she burst into crying again, burying her face in her father's shoulder. Will held her comfortingly, a blank look on his face. Blackbird, who had been pacing around the room silently, handed Will a scrap of paper she'd found on the table. Scrawled in barely-legible handwriting was a simple note:

"I have your wife, and I will not hesitate to kill her. If you ever want to see her alive, you and Captain Sparrow will be at Isla de Muerta in no less than a week. You destroyed my family, Mr. Turner. I will not hesitate to do the same to yours."