Since you all were so lovely and sent in so many reviews this chapter is a bit longer than usual. Many warm thanks to Smithy, hurricane1714, lady angst, Telcontar Rulz, master of time, AKA Parfait, WillsElizabeth23, Anonymous, and lynxlan!
Anonymous Reviewer Responses:
Smithy: Thanks very much for the review! No, indeed, drinking is not advisable while pregnant. I was a touch leery to put that in but I wanted to really protray that Elizabeth's nerves are shot. She's driven to an emotional edge and merely wants to forget. Will's presence is really what she needs. And your nephew sounds absolutely adorable. :) I have a cousin with down syndrome and he's a sweetheart. Something about kids with medical conditions makes them be more loving, open, and trusting. May God bless your little guy!
master of time: Hawthorne has a few brain cells missing, for sure. But then, Will and Elizabeth always seem to attract the more...eclectic villains. :) As for Elizabeth, she is doing some things she probably shouldn't. Be at rest though, her swordfighting days are soon to be over. Rum-drinking days were given the boot just as soon as I'd finished her dream sequence. Thanks so much for the review!
AKA Parfait: Yes, but isn't angst fun? The reunion might be harder than Will and Elizabeth think. The Pirates of the Caribbean world is never simple. Thanks so much for the review!
WillsElizabeth23: It's my pleasure. I really enjoyed hearing what my readers have to say. A new perspective is always welcome. :) And yes, you are correct. Will was put through the washer last chapter. As I seem to have an aversion to never allow anything nice happen to Will, I wouldn't expect a reprieve for a while yet. Will and Elizabeth are going to be in the same general area, indeed. But so is Jack, and Hawthorne, and the Wood girls, and a rather nasty new character. Making amends might be difficult. Thanks very much for the review!
Anonymous: Thanks very much! And yes, Will's pain makes it hard to think about anything else. Never fear though, Elizabeth never strays far from his mind. :)
Chapter 19: From the Frying Pan to the Fire
"Monsieur?" A soft feathery voice asked.
Will groaned, managing to pry open one eye then snapping it shut less than a heartbeat later. It was too bright and it felt as though he had a pair of battling ships inside his head.
"Monsieur, please, wake." The voice persisted, gently patting his hand.
He tried to roll over but halted the instant bolts of pain raced up his spine. "Liz'beth, no." He murmured, trying to get her to leave him alone. Didn't she know he was tired?
The voice went quiet then started up again this time a little more forcefully. "Monsieur, I am not 'Liz'beth'. I'm Elaine. Don't you remember?"
Something nagged at the corners of his mind but he couldn't think of what it was…He tried to sit up.
The pricking increased and suddenly, all went dark.
"Stupid little buggers…" Jack muttered, highly irritated. He was in the midst of wrestling the maggots out of his dry bread. His brown fingers were halfway swallowed up by the crusty stuff while his face screwed up in almost obsessive concentration.
"Ah! Gotcha!" His fingers closed around a wriggling little body and he yanked it out, eyeing the smooth shell and small beady face spitefully. "Trying to eat up Cap'n Jack Sparrow's food, aye?"
He tossed it over the ship's rail contemptuously and retorted quietly to its tiny speck self as it tumbled into the sea, "my biscuit."
"Cap'n?" Gibbs mounted the stairs as Jack smacked his lunch against the crate he was perched on, looking for more invaders.
"Wot?" He answered curtly, cross with the amount of time it was taking to clean out his food.
"We're comin' up fast on Alabanza Vacía."
Jack snarled quietly. "Oh, well, that's jus' wonderful." He crossed the deck to his first mate and before stepping down the stairs he handed a very confused Gibbs a riddled biscuit.
"Bloody crawling with buggers," was his only comment. And whether he was talking about Alabanza Vacía or his lunch Gibbs would never know.
Badgers was bored.
Too bored.
In fact, this boredom was likely the worst known to mankind. He had tried sleeping. He had tried counting every knothole in sight. He had tried every game imaginable.
Nothing had worked.
He wanted some fun. And Turner was the only fun they'd got this voyage. Everything else was battles, death, and boredom, sheer, undiluted, painfully dull boredom.
They weren't allowed to touch the French wenches under pain of death and well, he wasn't about to risk life and limb for entertainment yet.
Not his life or limbs anyway.
So, it had fallen to Turner to amuse the crew. At this point it time it had only been well-timed shoves to create havoc for the blacksmith and taunting jeers to remind him of his 'place' but the diversion created by that was quickly losing its savor. Especially after the flogging three days ago.
Oh, how the poor maggot had squirmed, trying to be heroic in bearing his pain quietly. The weather-worn sailor chuckled dryly.
They would have some fun with him tonight though. He was sure of it. Hawthorne was in the infirmary, too exerted from the whipping to order his crew about. The replacement officer was a water-boned man with a pale complexion who would crumble at the first threat.
Yes, they would have some fun, starting with Turner.
Badgers shifted at his lookout post and smiled. Only two more hours to wait…
Smoke, heavy and smothering, covered the bay of Alabanza Vacía. It licked out over the black waters of the sea but halted only a hundred yards out as if it wanted to keep its potency cloistered about the huts.
Her docks were empty and quiet as all the ship's masters crowded to the bars and dens this time of night. Only the pickpockets, knaves, and other comparatively harmless vagabonds slunk along the street's dark alleyways.
The night, overall, was peaceful. The stars glittered like diamonds and the moon's glow spilled over the earth like satin.
But none of this was seen by Will or the Wood girls.
The girls huddled together at one edge of the cell while Will tried to find some rest, no matter how uneasy and nightmare filled it might be. His back screamed at the slightest disturbance but his eyes ached for sleep. However, sleep was not an easy thing to acquire.
Elizabeth's furious face kept taunting him and her forceful words burned his mind like a brand each time slumber came tantilizingly close.
Not quite ready to close his eyes to chase sleep for the fifth time that evening, he stared at the musty boards above them, making mental patterns in the wood's grain. For minutes everything was still. No one spoke or moved. Slowly, Will's eyes began to droop and the heaviness of his eyelids seemed almost too much to bear.
Suddenly, there was a slam and a round of thumping then all went still above their heads.
"Monsieur?" Mariel managed to ask before the thumping sounded at the crest of the stairs leading to the brig.
A loud cacophony of voices and stamping sounded the arrival of a cluster of crewmembers, their eyes glazed with strong alcohol and their laughter without true mirth. Instead, it was the hollow bark of haunted souls.
The Wood girls instinctively shrank back, their eyes widening at the men's inebriated condition. Will's expression became shadowed.
"Turner, don't look so glum, mate." One particularly drunk man slurred. "Can't take a few beatings?"
The men around him erupted in another round of clamorous laughter, nearly tripping over themselves in their glee.
"Lemme tell you somethin', a lot of us," the man waved at himself and the men crowding the premises, "we've seen worse. Ya see, 'awthorne, 'e can be kinda light on fellows sometimes…and Turner, ya can't be a real man until you've really been beaten by a man, aye?" He reached through the corroded bars and patted Will's cheek, even as the blacksmith turned away, uninterested with the empty barbs of a few drunks.
"Ey! Badgers! 'e doesn't want to play!" A man with a sparse head of dark hair giggled, startling everyone with the high pitch and sending half of the men into fits of amusement.
'Badgers' grinned wickedly as he watched Will's eyes flicker in icy aversion. "Maybe 'e doesn't…" the man's flew to the huddled forms just past Turner. "but I bet they do…french, aren't ye? They's loose, ain't they?"
"But the captain says we aren't to touch the pretties." A burly sailor snarled in obvious disdain for Hawthorne's orders, turning to spit in disgust.
"But the captain isn't here is 'e…" Badgers licked his lips and brushed a hand over the cell lock.
The sisters shied away further, eyes bright with shock but smoldering in a touch of anger at the slight to their honor.
"Badgers…" One young man at the fringe of the group who have consumed less of the spirits than his counterparts, warned.
"Oh, I know…but's so much fun to see 'em squirm." Badgers's grin had yet to fade, his pale gray eyes snapping to Will. "But Turner, we can play with 'im."
Jack smiled satisfactorily.
Alabanza Vacía lay before them in all her wicked and vast brilliance and in a few short hours his debt would be paid, leaving him a free man with only the open sea and a great longing for rum to guide him.
Turning back from the rail, he faced his laboring crew. "Oi! Gibbs! Prepare the longboat. I will be going ashore…" he paused.
Just himself?
Fidgeting, he added, "and 'alf of the crew."
"Half the crew, cap'n?"
"I-they…jus' get them in the boats, savvy?"
"But captain I thought you said no one but you would be going ashore."
"I've decided…that it would be beneficiary and benefactorial that Mrs. Turner should also venture into this…gallimaufry."
Gibbs was slow to realize Jack's intent. "And so the crew's to come…for…protection…"
"For the whelp's bonnie lass." Jack interjected, interrupting Gibb's confused rambling. After all, he couldn't let the idea get in people's heads that he wanted the protection. No indeed, that would be as unforgivable as letting barnacles attach their buggery little selves to his precious Pearl.
"Ah, of course, cap'n. I'll have 'em get ready right off." He made to leave then stopped. "Cap'n, will you be tellin' the lass that's she's going or shall I?"
The moment Will was shoved on deck a blast of warm air hit them as solidly as water. Clouds churned on the horizon and high winds stirred the articles about them, tugging at clothing, and whipping hair about faces. However, that tepid breeze did not to sharpen the men's senses and if anything it only served to further lull them into a drunken haze.
But if they were drunk, they did not show it in the attention they paid Will. Their grip was as tight and inescapable as before. Not only did their watch over him never cease, they had taken the precaution of binding his hands tightly together behind his back with a long strip of sturdy twine.
As they dragged him to the center of the deck, a fat droplet of water landed on his nose. A groan pressed against his throat. It seemed as though every part of the British Military was working against him. But it appeared a little extraneous to have the weather be an enemy as well.
Behind him, there was a soft cry and he managed to catch a glimpse of the three sisters being pushed along.
Weakly, he tried to fight the hands that grasped his arms and shoulders only to get struck across the brow, sending hot flashes of pain through his head.
The men laughed raucously at this, nearly doubled over in their inebriated mirth, unaware of the sprinkling of rain. "Look at 'im! Poor coward!" they jeered, their loud voices increasing the pounding in Will's skull.
When Will was still trying to find his bearings after a several minutes, a few of the men became uneasy, "Aw, Badgers, I think you hit him too hard."
"Nah, I didn'. 'e's just fakin'." The burly man bellowed. He clasped one of Will's dark locks and used it as a handle to shake the younger man's head. "See?"
Will blinked rapidly, endeavoring to bring the world and its colors back into focus. But it was harder than he anticipated.
"No, mate. Look at him. You're gonna spoil the fun too soon."
"No, I ain't. You're the one who's gonna spoil the fun too soon, Twig."
"Hey!" Twig shoved past a few other crewmembers, face pinching in anger. "I'm not the one clouting people too hard over the head, ya thick-headed goon."
"Oh, I'm the goon!?" Badgers released his hold on Will, knocking him onto the deck and stepping over his prone body, fists clenched and eyes dark.
The men's conversation quickly became heated but Will barely heard it. It felt as though cotton had been stuffed in his ears. Sharp pain laced up through his hands and for many moments he could not figure out why.
Slowly, he wigged his fingers, brushing something cold and firm. Metal. That much was deduced. It was the next revelation that sent hope flying though his veins once more.
Cradled in his palm and wetted with his blood, was a thin but razor sharp dagger. It had scraped the skin on the center of his left palm, causing a stinging fire to spread up his arm from the shallow incision but that seemed entirely insignificant now.
This was his chance for freedom. This was his chance to find Elizabeth.
Easing it around so the blade rested underneath his bonds, he began the laborious process of sawing away at the coarse strands. Mercifully, the crew was now fully involved in a brawl and did not even spare their prisoner a second glance.
Moments that seemed horribly too long later, the cords snapped, and the painful but exhilarating feeling of freed hands zinged up his body, carrying an odd twinge of pain with it.
Daring to breathe for worry of being found out, he started to wriggle backwards, cringing as his torn back shrieked in riposte.
It was then that the squabbling crew turned. For an instant all was still, save for the patter of rain and the cadence of Will's difficult attempts to breathe.
However, their brains ceased their brief pause in action. Suddenly and in a wordless roar they rushed forward, drunken limbs moving clumsily but still maintaining great speed.
With swiftness he didn't know he could muster, Will clambered to his feet, bare fists and bloodstained dagger at his side, ready to defend his newfound liberation.
Like animals converging upon prey, the crew surged towards him, a sea of furious faces and clubs.
At first, Will held his own very well. He had a bit of room to maneuver and he was quick on his feet. Unfortunately, the speed adrenaline had lent him faded quickly at the strenuous supply demand the fight was requiring.
Two blows connected with his ribs heavily almost simultaneously, driving out the air in his lungs with a quick whoosh.
His repercussion was three howling men clutching various swollen appendages. Resolute not to go down without a fight, he readied himself for what could only be a stronger attack.
But it never came.
Instead, a firm, accented voice broke the scuffle. "Leave him alone or so help me I will fill you all with lead."
Slowly, all heads turned to see Celia standing near the rail, far from anyone's grasp. If not for the two pistols held tightly in her hands and the grim expression on her face, the picture would have the meaning of innocence.
The smooth ribbons that tied back her dark curls were sadly drooped from captivity but the rain brightened the color. And even the fabric of her dress seemed heightened, perhaps by the gloom around them or just the way she stood.
"I meant what I said." She spoke firmly, despite the warm rain now cascading from the troubled sky.
As if lead weights had been attached to their feet, the crew slunk back.
Will edged towards her, eyes roving the crowd of defeated men, daring any of them to threaten him again.
A muffled cry for help brought Celia's attention to the other side of the sailors and she quickly yelled, "Let my sisters go!"
The crowd parted again. Mariel and Elaine were held by separate men. One man's grubby fingers were buried in Elaine's silky hair while the other man had a firm grip about Mariel's waist. Snarling, they released their grapple on the two older girls and pushed them viciously, sending Mariel sprawling onto the deck.
Harsh laughter accompanied her attempts to scramble back up but they went quiet at a hard look and a gesture with the pistols from Celia.
When Elaine and Mariel were next to Celia did she seem to relax a tad. Will, meanwhile, had made his way toward the young French girl, swiping the blood spilling over his burst lip away.
Celia, as soon as he was close enough, thrust the weapons into Will's hands and stepped back with her sisters, eager to be rid of the pressure the firearms accompanied.
Still simmering with silent fury the men watched as Will directed the girls on how to lower a longboat into the black sea, eyes never leaving the group of sullen sailors. The Waking Power was anchored, sure enough, but Alabanza Vacía was resting just beyond what someone could swim. However, it was not far away with a longboat and it would be a swift trip to pull into her docks.
The sister's worked quickly, having no desire to remain on this ship any longer, and in just a short amount of time they were prepared to push off.
"Everyone lie down on the deck." Will ordered, praying he could remain on his feet until they were in safety.
The crew obeyed, alcohol fogged minds never realizing that wet powder would not fire and even if it did by some miracle that he only had two pistols, hence two shots. And while the sailors became better acquainted with the main deck's wood grain the girls settled in the longboat and held the pistols as Will let himself down.
Shoving off, Will rowed as hard as he could, eager to put as much distance as possible between them and the infuriated crew.
Only when the Waking Power was a shadow looming on the horizon did they hear the shouts of drunken men, trying to find their little boat on the black waters through sheets of water.
Almost as one they breathed a heavy sigh of relief. They had escaped the Waking Power's clutches and Alabanza Vacía was well within eyesight. Safety was firmly in their grasp.
Little did they know, however, that they had only moved from the frying pan to the fire.
TBC...