Tia Dalma walked around her small cottage, cleaning up a little bit.
"Evanlyn?" She called out after a while.
"What's wrong?" a female voice answered, and a few seconds later a teenage girl walked inside. She had frizzy brown hair and hazel colored eyes.
"I think we're getting guests today, please gather some herbs out of the garden, alright?" Tia asked with her heavy accent. Evanlyn nodded and started to walk out again before she turned around.
"Are they the reason why you can't have me leave already?" the eightteen year old asked curiously. The swamp witch didn't respond right away.
"They might be…" she eventually muttered before she started to look for a specific vial.
Achmed sat in his hammock pondering about what his captain had said a few days before. He was shaken out of his thoughts when Aaron walked into the room. Achmed looked at the younger boy questioningly and waited for him to say something.
"Captain Barbossa says we have almost reached Tia Dalma's Island." Aaron told. Achmed nodded and sighed. "I can't think of a price to pay her." He muttered. Aaron thought for a while.
"The Captain didn't say what she wanted, right?" He asked, trying to recollect his memories of their conversation with Barbossa. Achmed shook his head.
"He didn't…" he answered before taking out his dagger and starting to twirl it around. Aaron's eyes widened.
"That's it!" He exclaimed excitedly.
"What?" Achmed asked confused, stopping twirling his dagger.
"The dagger, it's silver isn't it? We can use it as a payment, we won't need it back home anyway." Aaron explained.
"That's brilliant!" Levy said. The boy had just entered the sleeping deck, and had listened to the last part of the conversation between his friends. The three boys looked at the dagger and smiled to each other. That small weapon had become their ticket home.
Pintel entered the sleeping deck too. "Come on, ya scurvy rats, If you want to meet that swamp witch, you'll have to come with us now."
On another pirate ship, a few miles away, Arvin, Yuri, Collin, Mary, Ann and Martin were thinking about the payment for Tia Dalma too. When Jack had surprised his complete crew, by sleeping in one of the hammocks with them, he had started a conversation with the boys and he had showed them his payment.
Now, the six outsiders were sitting in a circle on the deck. Every once in a while, somebody would throw an idea into the circle, and they would think about it, discuss it, and eventually decide it wouldn't be enough to pay for the six of them to get home.
"We could offer here information." Mary said softly. The girl hadn't spoken much, and the others were surprised when she finally did.
"Information about what?" Arvin asked, voicing everybody's thoughts.
"We are from another world, we can offer her information about that." Mary shrugged.
"Or," Ann started, with a glint in her eyes. "We can offer her information about her future." Her friends grinned.
"That's perfect, I think she will consider that a payment."
While they were talking they hadn't noticed how the crew had gotten tense, as the ship neared a small bay. Ann frowned, as she faintly heard soft tones of a strange melody. She looked at Mary.
"Did you hear that?" She asked softly. Mary nodded slowly. The both of them listened more intently, and they could hear the song more clearly now.
"Oh my God." Mary muttered, she looked around, and saw that most of the crew members had plugged their ears.
"Mermaids" She and Ann cried out together.
"Guys, you need to plug your ears." Mary said, her voice slightly higher than normal. Yuri raised an eyebrow.
"What do we need to do?" he asked.
"Plug your ears." Mary repeated, her eyes darting to the water. She couldn't see anything, but the sound of the mermaids got stronger.
"Why?" Arvin asked.
"Just do it!" Ann screamed at them, clearly at the verge of panicking. The boys hesitatingly put their fingers in their ears, while Mary ran to the captain's cabin. When she returned, she had a few candles made from soft bee wax in her hands. Collin was about to take his hands from his ears, but a glare of Mary stopped him. She broke a the candle in pieces and handed them out.
"Make plugs out of those, fast." She instructed them.
"What's happening?" Arvin demanded.
"Mermaids." Ann answered simply, still with an edge of panic in her voice.
"There are some fishladies swimming around here, so what." He said, relaxing, he really didn't get what the panic was about.
"Okay, let me rephrase that." Ann said, irritated. "They are sirens. The kind of mermaids who lure you into the water with their song, and KILL you!" She told him, almost screaming the last part.
The seriousness of the situation finally got to Arvin, and he too plugged his ears with the bee wax as fast as he could. It wasn't a moment too soon either, because when all the males on board had their ears plugged, Ann and Mary could hear the first mermaid clearly.
The tension on the ship got stronger, and Mary realized that even though everyone had plugged their ears, they could still faintly hear the song. The crew was working even harder, the men wanted to get as far from the beautiful threat as possible. When everybody had found a job to do, Mary paused for a bit, and listened.
The only things carrying the melody of the song were the clear voices of the mermaids. The gentle tones eased her mind, and Mary felt how all her worries slipped away, leaving a humming silence in her head. The girl saw how a few mermaids supported themselves on the railing of the pearl, and she walked closer.
The mermaid stopped singing and Mary felt how her thoughts slipped back in her mind again. The mermaids wet, wavy hair glistened in the light. Mary stopped dead in her tracks when she saw a flash of pity in the eyes of the sea creature.
"I'm sorry." The mermaid whispered before she let go of the rail and let herself fall in to the ocean again. Those words were enough to shake Mary out of her dazed state completely, and filled with fear she turned around. She was just in time to see how a blond haired mermaid reached out to Collin, ready to grab the dazed boy and drag him into the dark water.
A/N: Hey everybody, I'm so sorry about not updating sooner! I can come up with a thousand excuses why this wasn't up earlier, but you probably don't want to hear it, do you? Anyway, vacation has started for me, so I'll upload more chapters soon, I promise. Tell me what you think about this chapter, and hopefully until next time!
Love, Piuletta