For three days- 't'ree days'- Barbossa refused to discuss anything with Latonya. She'd begin with, "Tia Dalma say dat.." or, "You wanta know why…" and he'd flash her a look, draw in his breath sharply or even just go completely still. Latonya would never pursue the sentence.
Nor did he attempt to renew contacts, look up old acquaintances, threaten or exhort or do anything other than drink, eat, and sleep. He barely uttered a word at all. But he could feel hot, remorseless life refilling his veins with every debaucherous hour, and for three days just the sensation of being alive again, after undeath and death, was almost too much pleasure to bear.
At the end of the third day, he went for a swim in the bay.
Hitting the salt water almost killed him. He screamed softly, swamped by the biting, saline cold. He'd forgotten the thrill of the sea, even at the shallows. He splashed loudly for a few minutes, marvelling at the sensation of spray on his face, then knelt down so his face was underwater, and blew bubbles. A lobster investigated his knee.
"Bllbbbrrr," he said. "BbblllrrrllBBBllllRRrr!"
When he ran out of air, he bobbed back up again, and started to doggy-paddle back to the beach. He winked up at the moon, which seemed disinclined to make a walking skeleton out of him.
Latonya was sitting on the beach, on his pile of clothes, wearing a man's shirt and a ragged skirt, drinking rum. "Fun?" she asked, as he waded ashore.
"Better than rum," he said, giving her bottle an askance look. "My God, but I've missed the sea."
She was looking him over with a grin on her face. "You swim in underwear?"
He looked down. "Don't want any mermaids to fall hopelessly in love with me now, do I?" he replied, trying to look dignified. "Get orf my clothes if yer don't like what yer see."
Latonya fell onto her side and he tugged his oversized breeches over his sodden drawers. He sat down beside her, barefoot, and took the rum off her. She sneezed out some sand and sat up.
They watched the breakers for a while.
She started to say, "So, you wanta know why…?" He made a noncommittal grunting noise, so Latonya launched lethargically into her explanation.
"Jack Sparra, him done bad, done made a deal with Davy Jones. You ever wonder where De Black Pearl came from?" Barbossa shurgged- in truth, it hadn't bothered him in the slightest. "Well, Jack Sparra done promised a soul to Davy for t'irteen years of sailing."
Barbossa smirked. "He got short-changed. He only lasted two years."
Latonya cocked her head to him to show she was listening, but made no reply to his quiet boast. She continued, "T'irteen years are up. Davy Jones wants payment."
Barbossa shrugged. "And what's this got ter do with me? Please note: ay, he's Captain Jack Sparrow, Miss Vaughn. He's famous fer wriggling out of every tight spot." Barbossa's face clouded over slightly as he said this. "And, bee, if yer remember, I mutinied against him. If I could help, I wouldn't, and I can't, so there's not much point in talking to me."
Latonya was listening to him politely. Having her head on one side made her resemble an intelligent bird, which in truth she had more in common with than a human woman- she couldn't read, Barbossa recalled, she couldn't write, she liked brightly coloured things but lacked a sense of style and connection, and of course she sang, slightly off-key, all manner of strange, half-coherent songs. Quite suddenly, as he was reflecting on this, Latonya half clambered, half fell out of her clothes and wandered into the water. Barbossa shrugged and lay back on the sand.
About fifteen minutes later (just as he was dozing peacefully off), Latonya returned and sat, mothernaked and dripping, beside him. Both her breasts and her biceps were large and round, and she had chest muscles that made Barbossa feel very inferior. As he watched, her ebony, lacquered skin dried.
"Watch my hair," she instructed. Barbossa had in fact been fascinated by the oily slide of her thigh muscles beneath her skin (bigods, but he wouldn't want to take on this woman in a boxing ring), but he transferred his gaze lazily.
Latonya's afro had been fluffed out by the swim, but as he watched it curled inwards, tightening. Barbossa was reminded irresistibly of Medusa.
When her hair had settled down, he said, "Very clever. What was that in aid of?"
"You know how I do that?"
"No."
"Neither do I." She stretched out an arm. "You see how my skin is not affected by de seawater?"
He admired the arm. "Yes, well done."
"You see how I do not age?"
"Yes." He didn't like where this was going. Latonya's usually calm voice was marked by some agitated inflection. "Lucky you."
"You wanta know what I gave Tia Dalma for this gift?"
Barbossa sighed. "No, I don't."
"Good, because I ain't telling you." She grinned, and leaned back on her elbows. The moonlight made her belly-button shine silver. She looked like a carving.
At length, Barbossa said, "Yer know, I didn't ask the voodoo woman to bring me back ter life."
"She gone done it anyway," Latonya replied, "and now yer life depend on her."
Barbossa didn't like to inquire how she'd managed the transformation, and somehow he doubted Latonya's avian intellect would have the capacity to give him the answer. He'd have to find out later. "And what does she want from me?" he asked, softly.
"Jack Sparra going to die," Latonya said. She spoke levelly once again, and it took a moment or two for the meaning of her words to sink in. "Tia Dalma can feel it- don't ask me how she knows. But him can't cheat the sea, him a sailor, same as you. But you, you been dead, you got the know-how to bring him home."
"That's news to me," snapped Barbossa. Why, he was thinking, why do I always, always end up trailing around after Jack? Do I have to be his first mate for the rest of my life?
Latonya shrugged. "Tia Dalma say so. She say dat sleep is a shadow of death, and in dreams, dere is a map of de path."
"And if I decide not to give Tia Dalma my map?" Barbossa asked, drily.
Latonya gave him a grin. "Den you die in your sleep."