A/N: This one is a bit shorter, but the chapters following it start to get longer and less exposition-y. Thanks to all my readers! Reviews appreciated, as always. :)

Chapter Three

The journey to Tortuga was about as tame a voyage as Jessica had experienced. The seas were calm, the wind was favorable, and the crew mostly ignored her. Will found ways to help the crew in exchange for their passage. She, on the other hand, spent her time silently reacquainting herself with the sea. Any time she offered to lend a hand to the crew, she was met with swift opposition. She could tell it bothered Will, but, as long as they didn't become hostile with her, she didn't give a damn what the crew thought of her. Men judged by her appearance, but the sea only judged her by her skill. The sea didn't care what gender of person sailed upon her beautiful, yet deadly, waters. In the broadest sense, the sea didn't care about people at all. People were insignificant to the sea. But if people wanted to matter to the sea, they could learn to use her nature as their own. Jessica had known some of her hidden secrets since she was a young girl, and had learned even more over the years. She knew how to use some of the sea's power, however miniscule, as her own. That gave her power most men could only dream of. She knew how to read the winds, the tides, and how to spot a stormfront from hundreds of yards off. She learned what gave sails their strength and what could tear them to shreds. Above all, unlike most of the men she encountered at sea, she did not entertain the notion that she ever was in control of the sea. The sea may lend her power to those few who know how to use it, but the sea could quickly turn those powers against anyone using them.

Jessica sighed, breathing in the salty air of the ocean around her. Though the dark blanket of night had fallen long ago, she could still make out the rolling crests of the waves below the deck. The moon and stars illuminated the night sky just enough. Jessica leaned against the portside railing of the ship, waves sending the occasional spray up toward her face. Her entire body felt more alive at sea, as if she had merely been a shadow of herself for the past months.

"I didn't realize how much you missed it."

Will's familiar voice rose over the sound of the waves hitting the hull of the ship. Jessica smiled, turning to face him.

"Is it that obvious?"

"It doesn't take an abundance of cleverness to see you belong out here."

He leaned on the railing beside her, looking out over the dark waters. As he watched the waves, she watched his face. There was a softness to his expression she had not seen since the morning of the wedding.

"It suits you, too," she said softly. "The sea — I can tell you feel better out here."

"I'm sure it doesn't feel as natural as it does to you, but, yes, I have grown to enjoy being on the water. There's this…freedom about it. It makes your worries seem smaller, somehow."

A small smile crept back onto Jessica's face, hearing him talk about the sea in that way.

Without taking his eyes off the water, Will suddenly asked, "What happened, Jessica?"

Her brow furrowed in confusion, hoping he wasn't about to ask what she thought he was.

"Between you and Beckett, I mean. What happened that makes you so…wary of him?"

Ah, there it is, she thought.

The question she knew he had been wanting to ask for days now. She took note of how careful he was not to say "afraid." For her sake, maybe, but it was true. She was afraid of Beckett, that was as plain to see as her love of the ocean. She took a deep breath, letting it out slowly before replying.

"That's a long story."

"We have time."

"I know."

She couldn't avoid this conversation any longer and Will deserved to know.

It took Jessica a few moments of looking out over the open ocean to gather enough strength to start. Will was silent beside her, understanding that this was difficult for her. Until she started to speak, Jessica herself didn't even realize how badly she longed to get this part of her life off her chest.

"I was very young at the time, living on an island with my mother. Most of the early events I only remember because they were told to me later. You see, I never really knew my father. I heard plenty about him from my mother, but he was always out at sea. Jack, on the other hand, had come to stay with us plenty of times before. By the last time I saw him, Jack had made quite a name for himself. The next time we heard from him, many already knew him as the infamous Jack Sparrow. How he came by that name, he would never tell me, but—"

"Wait, hold on. Sorry," Will apologized for interrupting, "his surname isn't Sparrow?"

Jessica smiled mischievously, "No."

"Your surname isn't Sparrow."

"It's who I am, isn't that what a name is? Now can I please finish the story? You can have a crisis about my identity later."

"Right. Sorry."

"Anyway, longer story short, Jack had established himself well in a life on the sea. It was a few years before we heard anything from him again. By that time, I was old enough to remember what happened for myself. Jack had become a captain…under the employment of the East India Trading Company."

She saw how badly Will wished to interrupt out of pure shock again, but he held himself back this time.

"According to what Jack told me - take that how you will - he had trouble with another band of pirates and turned to the EITC in hope of a command. A command which he eventually got in the form of captaining a ship called the Wicked Wench. That was when he met a man named Cutler Beckett, who ordered him to find a lost treasure on an island named Kerma. I was still a child, of course, and I knew none of this. What I did know was one day, a strange ship with a whole crew of strange men made port on the island I called home. They all wore nearly identical uniforms and answered to the man dressed in the long black cloak. They marched into the town and pulled out every child who lived there, including me. Our mothers were held back at the point of bayonets.

'Who here carries the name of Sparrow? Show yourself!' the man in black commanded us.

When no one stepped forward, I remember that cruel smile that crossed his face.

'Very well. For each minute you keep me waiting, Sparrow child, my men kill one of your mothers. You're all families of pirates, after all. Call it a mercy I don't have you all hanged here and now,' he said.

"I knew he wanted me, for whatever reason, he knew Jack. But it only took one look at the frightened face of my mother to convince me to stay silent. That is…until the blast from a bayonet overpowered the crying of about half a dozen mothers. A young woman who I had seen around town before fell to the ground, bleeding from a fatal wound. Her son, not much older than me, screamed beside me. I stayed silent until I saw how serious this man was. I screamed at him to stop, that I was the one he wanted. I screamed out to anyone who was listening that I was Jack Sparrow's sister, to please leave everyone else alone. I remember how terrified my mother looked. I remember her screams as the men left the other children and grabbed me, carrying me through the town to the port.

"I don't remember exactly how many days I was aboard that ship, but I spent all of them crying. It was a long journey and I had no idea what these men wanted with me. The man in black introduced himself as Cutler Beckett, told me he had employed my brother and that Jack had betrayed him. That he had stolen something from Beckett, something of great value. I knew this man was far from honorable, but it wasn't until I was much older that I got the entire story. But then…then, I had been angry with Jack. Angry that he had betrayed someone and put our lives in danger. I spent the remainder of my time on that ship being angry with him for things I did not understand. I thought of how much I wanted to yell at him the very next time I saw him. Tell him that he had gotten someone killed.

"But when another ship finally approached the one we were on, I got my chance and didn't take it. Jack appeared aboard that ship and Beckett swiftly took the three of us into his quarters. Behind closed doors, with just Beckett and Jack there…instead of yelling at my brother like I planned, I ran to him crying. I didn't exactly get far because Beckett grasped my arm so tightly I remember my fingers going numb. He held a sword to my neck and then started talking in that smooth, deadly confident voice he had addressed our town in.

'You have something of mine, Jack. I have something of yours. It's simple, let's make a deal,' I remember Beckett saying.

'People aren't property, mate. That's what you don't get.'

I remember they talked about that island, Kerma, and the people who lived there. Apparently Jack helped them escape from Beckett and his men and Beckett was not happy about it. I remember Jack blatantly refusing Beckett's orders, drawing his pistol, and demanding that Beckett release me. But then Beckett called his men in. Beckett shoved me into one of his men's arms as the others beat and held Jack down. I saw Beckett with the white-hot branding iron only seconds before Jack started screaming. I remember Jack being only half-conscious as they drug us both out to the deck. But the sight of the ship that Jack arrived on completely engulfed in flames…that image will never leave my mind. There was the Wicked Wench, the ship Jack had worked so hard to captain, quickly burning in the water. Anyone else might have looked at Jack and thought he was crying out of the physical pain he was in, but I knew it was for the ship. That was the first and one of the only times I'd ever seen my brother cry.

"You've known Jack just long enough to know how miraculous his escapes seem. That day didn't seem escapable. At the time, I remember thinking we were both going to die at the hands of Beckett and his men. But as the Wicked Wench burned, cannonfire issued from behind Beckett's ship. There was another ship approaching. A large ship flying that unmistakable flag of a skull and crossbones. The man holding on to me raised a sword toward me and that seemed to be all the motivation Jack needed to be roused back to full consciousness. He managed to escape the grasp of the men holding him and stole one of their swords. It didn't take him long to run through the man who had threatened me, but it was long enough to distract him. While Jack was fighting, I saw Beckett trying to sneak up behind him. I ran for Jack, intending to shove him out of the way…and very nearly succeeded. Instead, I simply took the brunt of Beckett's attack against Jack. His sword cut clean across my back from my shoulder all the way to my hip. Other than the quick realization that I was going to die, I don't remember much after that. Only…I didn't die, of course. One of the first things I do remember afterwards was being in an insurmountable amount of pain. Other than that, it's all blank."

Jessica walked under the light of one of the lanterns hanging on the ship. As Will watched, she rolled up the back of her shirt to reveal part of the long, thin scar across her back. Will's eyes widened at the sight of it.

"How did you survive?" he asked, his voice so awestruck it was barely audible.

Jessica dropped the hem of her shirt and frowned, "I have no idea. A wound like that should have been fatal. All I know is I woke up days later being cared for by a kind woman in England, only shortly before I met you."

Even in the darkness, she could make out the flush of color in Will's face.

"Beckett used a child as a bargaining piece," he practically growled in disgust and disbelief. "What sort of man does that?"

"The ruthless kind."

"And he nearly killed you."

Jessica nodded slowly, looking back out over the ocean as a means to avoid eye contact with Will.

"Like I said, he's the cruelest man I've had the misfortune of meeting. He will do anything if it means he gets what he wants. He doesn't care who gets in his way."

She could feel the tremble in her voice as her emotions threatened to overwhelm her. Suddenly, Will placed a gentle hand on her shoulder.

"We'll make sure he can't harm anyone like that again. Once we find Jack and free Elizabeth, we'll figure it out…together."

"I have a feeling the only reason he agreed to me joining you was to see if I would betray my own brother. Probably to prove some twisted point. But, thank you."