Author's Note: Super long chapter alert! I had a place I wanted to end this chapter with, and it took longer to get there than I first thought.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Something Long Forgotten
"Mind the bow sail, ya floundering fool!" The captain roared, ducking as the boom of the sail swept over his shoulder where his head had just been. Water slicked from the canvas pelted Barbossa's already soaked form. He growled as Pintel hastily caught the rope and heaved the sail back in place.
The sky was darker than night even though it could only be mid afternoon. Rain pounded the blood-soaked deck as shipmen scurried about, slipping on the wet wood. Those less graceful pirates found themselves on their hands and knees swearing at the blood now creeping from the ship to their clothes and skin.
A waterfall of blood and water obscured the steps from the quarter deck to the main deck, but Barbossa barely noticed. He glanced over his shoulder just in time to see the splintered bowsprit and delicate figurehead of the defeated ship slip beneath the frothy waves.
He gave a hearty laugh to lift the spirits of his men, but it was forced all the same. The men cheered in answer. Barbossa said nothing, but slipped into his cabin and hung his drenched hat and overcoat on the hook by the door.
Lightning momentarily brightened the room and he made his way for the dim oil lamp swinging from the ceiling, He turned the spindle to lengthen the wick, and sat down wearily at the table. His head ached from the ringing of steel against steel, the screams of men, and the deep rumblings of thunder. He pressed his forefinger and thumb to the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes.
It had been ten years since Barbossa woke in the darkened room of the witch's stilted house. In that time battles had been fought and won, journeys had been undertaken, and adventures had. Most importantly however, the curse had been broken. Although freed from its bonds, Barbossa found that it had left lasting effects on his mind. Interviews with his shipmates whom also had suffered from the curse were no help, for it seemed only Barbossa's taste had been changed by the reversal.
Green apples, the thing he had wanted to savor more than anything else, were sour-too sour to relish, too disappointing in texture to enjoy. Every bite, or even the scent of one caused an unusual stirring in the back of Barbossa's mind, as if reminding him of something long forgotten.
His desire for feminine warmth was not what it had been in his days before the curse. In his incredulity he'd experimented with the women he'd always found satisfactory before. Although the sensations had returned, he felt only emptiness after, somehow weighted with a burden of unfathomable regret.
Several hammering knocks came from the door and Barbossa winced. Whoever was on the other side of that door would soon regret his choice. Barbossa crossed the room and furiously threw the door open. Ragetti clung to the doorframe, his entire body slumped sideways from holding the wounded form of a young man.
"Sorry ta bofer you , cap'tin," Ragetti apologized. "We pulled this fella from the water. Says he wants ta be part of da crew."
Barbossa snarled and grabbed the man's thin upper arm and relieved Ragetti of his hold. He lifted the slight man almost off the floor to look him in the face.
"What be yer name, ya scurvy pup?"
"Fausto De Faria." The man looked up challengingly, his dark eyes burning and his lip curled into a sneer. Barbossa saw the man's face muscles quiver for a moment, and noticed the darkening rust-colored stain on his left side.
"I suppose it couldn't hurt to have a cabin boy." Barbossa spat out the title. The man tried to laugh, but it turned into a fit of coughing. He clutched his side and stood as upright as he could.
"I was first mate on The Laughing Storm."
"And I'm sure the position be still available," Barbossa replied, gesturing over the rail. Men who had gathered around to watch laughed at this comment, but Barbossa continued, "I have no need for some pretty-boy first mate. Take him to the infirmary; we want him cleaned up before we make him swab this filthy deck."
/\
Barbossa stood quite still at the wheel, hands resting lightly on the spokes. De Faria stood before him, fully restored to his health except the new bruise blooming on his high cheekbone.
"You sent for me, Captain?" His voice was calm, deliberate, and arrogant. Barbossa kept his eyes trained on the horizon. Looking at the man's smug face would only make him more furious.
"Tell me, De Faria, did your previous captain allow you ta fight anyone you pleased?"
"None of my previous crewmates challenged my authority."
"Ya got no 'thority on my ship, you jumped-up ruffian."
De Faria shrugged with a smirk. "They started it. It's not my fault they didn't do their own jobs. They're all threatened by my efficiency to do not only my own demeaning tasks, but to any that I see also need attending."
"If there be one more fight, I'll start thinkin' I have too many men on board, and I'll start downsizin'." Barbossa finally looked at De Faria. "Beginnin' with you. And I don't like downsizin'. Settin' up that plank be such a hassle."
De Faria nodded, still smiling. "Understood, Captain. Just let me know when you're ready for a first mate. I have a few ideas on who the expendable men are, if you do have to undertake the troublesome job of downsizing." He spun on his heel and left.
When he was gone Barbossa allowed himself a slight smile of his own. The man was infuriatingly arrogant, but he reminded Barbossa very much of himself.
"Cap'tin!"
Barbossa started, and saw Grapple running across the main deck towards him.
"Merchant vessel dead ahead. French flag. Sits 'eavy in da water."
"That's all I need," Barbossa mumbled to himself with a side smile. "Let's go, men!"
Sparks and glimmered on the hull of the French ship before the thunder of the cannons reached Barbossa's ears. Heavy splashes erupted only a few hundred feet from Barbossa's ship, The Sea Dragon.
Barbossa thought grimly of the superior ship that had been stolen from him so many years ago. The Pearl would have easily breezed up to the merchant ship before they would even have a chance to defend themselves.
"Full sails!" He shouted. The Dragon could not compare to The Pearl's speed, but what it lacked in pace it made up in defense. While most humble pirate ships had one set of ten gunports per side, The Dragon boasted two decks solely for cannons, and each deck provided twelve small windows for cannons to peer from.
The only problem was turning the ship fast enough and close enough without being riddled by cannon fire from the opposing ship. It had served Barbossa faithfully for the past seven years, however, and he had no doubt of who the victors would be.
The advantage was already theirs; the French vessel sat so heavily in the water with her legally-acquired goods that her sails were not up to the task of haste. The Dragon swiftly caught up and angled away from the cannon range.
As Barbossa's men prepared to board the ship from he port side, Barbossa caught sight of De Faria climbing up the rigging.
That's not part of the plan, Barbossa thought, watching the dark-skinned man with only half arrested interest. When he reached the boom of the topsail, he clambered to his feet on the rounded timber and cautiously made his way to the edge.
Then he leapt. He slid down against the foresail of the French ship until he caught a handful of rope from the rigging. De Faria dexterously made his way up the sail while Barbossa's other men began heaving planks into place to use as bridges to board the vessel. No one seemed to notice De Faria's progress except Barbossa.
The French crew had already begun gunfire at the pirates, but their pistols were terribly inaccurate. The few with rifles were able to bring a few pirates down, but by then Barbossa's men had already made their way onto the French ship, and guns were rendered useless. Ringing steel filled the air as swords caught the sunlight.
A clear, singing gunshot muted all other noises and caused all the men to look around wildly to find the source of the noise.
De Faria was standing at the helm, one arm wrapped around the captain and resting a wicked-looking dagger to his neck. His other arm was held high above his head and held a golden gun with a highly polished wooden handle. The French crew almost simultaneously lowered their weapons.
De Faria whispered something into the captain's ear and the captain began speaking to his men in French. Without a word they dropped their weapons and raised their hands up to their heads and made a tidy line against the railing.
Encouraged at this sight, the other men of The Dragon looked up to De Faria, who gave a side smile and pushed the captain down the stairs onto the main deck and to the front of the line.
What followed could only be compared to a firing squad. Smoke rose from the pirates' guns as the French crew stumbled and fell one by one until there were none left standing.
Something stirred in Barbossa's mind again, but he couldn't grasp it. He'd never thought of himself as a man controlled by a conscience or a servant to an almighty god, but in the past years he'd begun feeling this deep, unexplained feeling of a separation, as if something more important than himself were being pulled farther away from him when he let such killing happen. It was an unnerving feeling, compounded so because he knew he hadn't always felt this estrangement, but couldn't recall a single event that could have affected him so deeply.
/\
According to the captain's log, the French ship had been collecting donations from all over the Caribbean to deliver goods and building supplies to French missionaries in Colombia and Panama.
Barbossa's men were disheartened to find the reason the vessel was so low in the water was not because of gold and jewels, but old bricks from torn down buildings and lumber. Several chests were full of clothing and blankets, and others full of children's toys or old dishes.
"Nothin' but old trash!" Pintel grumbled, kicking one such chest out of the way. The others seemed to be disheartened as well, and they all grumbled and swore with the opening of a new box to reveal nothing but grammar books and used Bibles, cracked teapots, or shoes.
Ragetti had found an old top hat and was rather pleased with himself.
"Guess them natives in the jungle won't need this," he commented to Pintel as he gestured to his aristocratic headwear. Pintel snorted, and slammed the lid down on crate full of iron nails and hammers.
Unperturbed, Ragetti raised the lid of yet another chest and began rummaging through sheet music and cookware. Near the bottom he found a small wooden box with bronze hasps. Hoping something valuable might be inside, he opened it to find nothing within. Sighing, he moved to close it, but something caught his eye. He opened it back up at stared for a moment, turning it towards the light to see better.
"Oy! Where do ya think yer goin'?" Pintel snapped, but Ragetti ignored him as he raced past to find the captain.
/\
Barbossa did not had an appropriate platform for his fury towards De Faria. At least, not one he could easily explain. So he went a different route.
The man sat across the table from him, chin in his hand, elbow on the table, eyebrow raised.
"I'm sorry," he said cooly, amusement in his eyes. "I guess we have different ideas of what 'pillage' and 'plunder' mean."
"Not at all," Barbossa said, possibly too swiftly. "I want me men workin' as a single unit. Soon as one strays with 'is own plan, they all want to play leader."
"Well, if my title was 'first mate', I'd have some authority to go my own way, now wouldn't I?"
It wasn't an argument Barbossa wanted to be having at the moment. The feeling of growing separation had weighed heavily on his mind all day and more than anything he wanted to figure out how he could go back to the way things had been.
When a knock came from the door he was grateful to say, "We'll finish this later, De Faria. Leave."
De Faria smirked and slid out the door just as Ragetti entered, wearing a ridiculous top hat.
"Nice hat," De Faria said absently. Ragetti grinned.
"What do ye want?" Barbossa snarled. His smile faded.
"Uh, somefin I found just now in the Frenchie's cargo." He laid a small wooden box on the table. "I didn' fink nuffin of it at first, but somefin about it . . . makes me feel like I've seen it b'fore. And your handwritin's in it. Under the lid."
Bewildered, Barbossa slowly opened the box and tilted it back to see writing that did indeed look like his. He read the words several times.
She shows you who you truly are
The words caused a great swelling in his heart- a place he was not accustomed to feeling things. It was obviously a message for someone, but for whom? In one instant the great distance Barbossa felt from . . . something vanished completely, but he still had no idea what his mind was withholding. He had no recollection of ever writing such words. It was possible the handwriting was not his, but if it wasn't, why had it caused such movement within him?
Who had received this box, and why was it back in here? Barbossa snapped the box shut and looked up at Ragetti.
"Where did ye find this?"
"In one of da boxes, sir. Wif a bunch'a paper and pots."
"Show me."
/\
After four hours of searching the messy records of the ship's secretary and the brief scribblings of the captain's log, Barbossa was able to track the box back to Port Royal. Possibly. There were several similarly described chests, none of which included the small box in its inventory, but only one description included the old collection of Easter cantatas that had been in the same chest.
"Change our bearings, De Faria," Barbossa ordered, climbing the narrow stairs back up to the main deck. De Faria saluted with a triumphant smile and Barbossa realized he'd just assigned him with a task generally given to the first mate. The young man fit the job description too damned well.
"Where to, Captain?" De Faria shouted, arms draped imperiously over the wheel.
"Port Royal. And I'm in a hurry." He carried the small box back into his cabin and set it on the table. He stared hard at it for several minutes, trying to remember where he'd seen it before. Why had he written such a message, and for what purpose? Who was the she in the message, and who was the you?
She shows you who you truly are.
And what are you, then? Barbossa buried his head in his hands in submission to the mystery. Perhaps Port Royal would hold the answers.
/\
"And why are we bothering with this?" De Faria asked again, tying a cravat around his neck. Barbossa rested a large blue hat on his own head and adjusted the medal on his breast.
"We be goin' fer answers, not bodies or treasure. We need ta look respectable."
De Faria laughed, rubbing a scuff on his newly-polished boots. "Si. It's been so very long since that word applied."
Barbossa glanced at Ragetti in the mirror. He was still wearing the absurd top hat.
"Ye'll not be wearin' that."
Ragetti's face fell as he touched the brim protectively. "I fink it makes me look like a gen'lemen."
"I think it makes you look like a dandy," Barbossa replied heartlessly.
"Or the village idiot," De Faria offered, and the two laughed. Ragetti reluctantly took off the hat and placed it lovingly on the table.
The Dragon was anchored at Fisherman's Harbor, which meant the three had to travel some ways before they reached the city. Barbossa had selected the two because Ragetti also felt some sort of connection to the box, and De Faria had quickly become his right hand man, even if he still refused to give him the title "first mate." It was mainly an issue of principle at that point, and they both knew it.
"I 'aven't been 'ere since we kidnapped that Swann girl," Ragetti said with reminiscence as they looked down the hill at the port spread out before them.
"Aye," Barbossa agreed absently.
"Where to first?" De Faria asked crisply. He was not the nostalgic type.
"City Hall."
Ragetti and De Faria whirled around to stare agape at Barbossa.
"You must be mad," De Faria argued. "They'll see right through us and we'll be hanged faster than you can say 'parlay.'"
"Or 'Bootstrap's bootstraps.'"
When it was Ragetti's turn to be stared at blankly, he shrugged and mumbled, "Always like sayin' it, s'all."
"Anyway," Barbossa continued, "we be needin' names of the people who did contribute goods to that ship. That be our startin' point."
A woman sat at a small desk of the lobby and smiled up at them as they entered.
"Hello, how can I help you fine gentlemen?"
Ragetti giggled and Barbossa hit him hard in the solar plexus with his elbow. Ragetti began coughing and whooping for breath as Barbossa and De Faria approached her. De Faria leaned over the desk, giving her a winning smile.
"You've already helped me, darling, with that lovely smile of yours."
The young woman blushed with a shy smile, and looked down.
"Actually," Barbossa began, "We be affiliated with the French organization that was here just recently taking donations to them poor mission'ries in middle 'n south America."
"Of course," the woman said, still looking down at the desk. "They were here just a week or so ago."
"We've volunteered to go from house to house to personally thank each person who donated," De Faria said smoothly, "but we need the list first. We were told a certain beautiful secretary of the city hall would be able to get it for us." He lifted her chin up with his thumb and forefinger. She smiled and scratched her neck self-consciously.
"One moment," she promised, and slipped out of the room.
"Shameless," Barbossa hissed. De Faria grinned ruthlessly. "Worked, didn't it?"
Ragetti had finally caught his breath. "Don't see why I couldn'a dunnit." His point was not acknowledged by either.
"I'm sorry," the woman said as she re-entered the room. She never took her eyes off De Faria. "Some of those that donated wished to be anonymous, but I remember the largest contributors were from the Potter family, the Lady Turner, the Rislingtons-"
"Lady Turner?" Barbossa interrupted, distracted.
"Yes, she inherited her father's mansion and fortune." The woman answered, glancing briefly from De Faria to Barbossa.
"Anyone else you can remember?" De Faria pressed, recapturing her attention.
"Yes, the, um, the Rislingtons, the Murtoggs, Col. Farthing, and Mr. Smythe from Bristol."
"You'll have to write that down, darling. I find you rather . . . distracting."
Barbossa cleared his throat loudly and De Faria jerked to an upright position. The woman giggled. She hastily wrote down the names and handed the paper to De Faria without even looking at Barbossa or Ragetti.
"Let's go, Casanova," Barbossa growled, grabbing De Faria's arm and towing him out of the building.
"It worked," De Faria argued, slapping the paper onto Barbossa's chest. Barbossa grabbed it and read the names.
"Where do we go first, Cap'tin?" Ragetti asked.
"Lady Turner." Barbossa replied. It was the only name on the list that he could find. The Swann Mansion was the largest house in Port Royal, and Ragetti had been there once before
The knocker swung heavily against the door and was promptly answered by a buxom maid. She looked curiously at De Faria, and then Barbossa. When she saw Ragetti she gave a little shriek and slammed the door.
"I fink she remembers me," Ragetti concluded.
"So it seems." Barbossa slammed his fist against the door. It swung open again to reveal a woman dressed in rich clothes. Her face was hard.
"What is the meaning of this?" She demanded. Before any of them could speak, she continued, "Get in here once, I can't have the neighbors wondering."
"Mrs. Turner, what a pleasure it be to see ye again." Barbossa bowed deeply.
"Thank God I can't say the same," Elizabeth snapped, resting her hands on her hips. "What do you want?"
"A little help, is all."
"You want my help?" Though still angry, there was a touch of curiosity in her voice. She glanced at De Faria. "And who's he?"
"Fausto De Faria at your service, signora." De Faria bowed his head humbly.
"The cabin boy," Barbossa barked. De Faria grinned. "And you remember Ragetti?" On cue, Ragetti lifted the eyepatch he'd been wearing to look less like a pirate to reveal his wooden eye.
"Of course. Now what could you possibly want my help with?"
Barbossa withdrew the small wooden box from his pocket and handed it to her. "Do ye recognize this?"
"No," her voice had grown softer, and she opened it. "'She shows you who you truly are.' What does that mean?" Elizabeth looked up at Barbossa
"That's why we be at Port Royal."
Elizabeth sighed heavily, glancing from the box to the three. She gave a reluctant smile.
"Would you like some tea?"
/\
"And you're sure that it's your handwriting?" Elizabeth asked, setting down her teacup and picking the box up again from where it sat on the table.
"Aye." Barbossa replied simply. It was an easier answer than trying to explain the feeling of separation and initial leap of his heart when he first read the words.
"Mother, who are they?" a child's voice came from the door. Elizabeth whirled out of her chair, her face pale.
"James!" She scolded, "I told you to stay in your room."
The boy looked down at his shoes and said nothing.
"These are just acquaintances of mine and your father. I haven't seen them in a very long time, and they stopped by to visit."
Barbossa laughed. "Aye, acquaintances be correct. Ye look just like yer father, boy."
The boy looked up eagerly at Barbossa. "You know my father?"
"Sailed with him, I did," Barbossa replied. Elizabeth watched him warily.
"That's enough, James. I want you to go back to your room for now."
"What do ye tell the boy his father does for a livin'?" Barbossa asked with interest once James had trudged back to his room.
"That he helps the sick and dying at sea. He'll learn the rest when he's older," Elizabeth snapped.
Barbossa exhaled a single laugh, and returned to his cup of tea. De Faria, lost by this exchange, asked, "Do you know where these people live?" He slid the paper over to her and she glanced at it.
"Why do you want to know?" She asked suspiciously.
"Cross me heart, Mrs Turner, we mean no 'arm. Just some innocent questions ta get ta the bottom of this mystery."
"Don't make me promises, Barbossa," Elizabeth sighed, "I know you."
Ragetti giggled.
"I swear that this man be an idiot and that I have no intentions of hurtin' anyone here today," Barbossa concluded. Elizabeth nodded, half smiling.
"I guess that's as good as I'll get from the ruthless Captain Barbossa. Let me get some paper and I'll draw you a map."