After breakfast, Agatha demanded a tour of the ship, which Jack and Elizabeth were only too happy to provide. After that, Elizabeth's energy was starting to fade, and Jacob was just waking up from his morning nap. Agatha offered to take the baby for an hour so Elizabeth could nap, which she did until just before lunchtime.

Agatha went in a little before noon to wake her up and help her dress—in an actual dress, this time. Agatha had noticed that Elizabeth was sleeping in the captain's cabin and seemed to know her way around it. She was amused at the dresser-drawer cot for little Jacob, but warned Elizabeth that if the baby weren't still recovering from his illness, that drawer wouldn't hold him very long. She noticed the canvas hammock strung up in the corner, but didn't say anything about it. It didn't seem entirely proper for Elizabeth to be sharing the captain's cabin with him, but her poor niece still couldn't stay alone and didn't seem to have any other option. Agatha was grateful they had been able to go and get her from Port Royale; otherwise, Elizabeth would have no other women around her at all!

At lunchtime, Jack popped in again. "Ought to be there in another hour or two," he said. He seemed distracted, sitting down with them and eating a few bites, then excusing himself to leave the cabin again. He was gone perhaps five minutes, then he returned and sat back down.

"Jack, what's going on? Is there another ship?" Elizabeth asked.

He shook his head. "Nothing." He ate another few bites. "Probably nothing." Another bite. "I'll let you know if it's something, all right?" And then he was up and out of the cabin again.

Elizabeth rolled her eyes and sighed. "Excuse me, Aunt," she said, and followed him.

She went up to the quarter-deck, where he was watching the horizon with a spyglass. He handed it to her without a word, and she trained it on the same spot he'd been watching.

"What am I looking at?" She asked.

"New Flimwell."

"Why is New Flimwell smoking?"

"The dreadful but unavoidable conclusion to which I am pessimistically jumping is that New Flimwell is smoking because New Flimwell is on fire. We're going to find out what is going on before I let you and your aunt leave the ship," he said grimly. He took the spyglass back and began scanning the horizon. "Don't see any other ships. Have to wait until we get there to find out what happened." He lowered the spyglass and looked at her. "You ought to go below and keep your aunt company. No need to alarm her, eh?"

She nodded. "Right." She went back down.

"What is it? What's wrong?" Agatha asked her.

"Oh, just Jack being over-dramatic, as usual. We ought to be to New Flimwell in just over an hour," Elizabeth said. "I can't wait to show you my home. It isn't much, but the view is just lovely."

When the Pearl anchored in the little cove below Elizabeth's house, Jack went ashore first with Gibbs. They landed on the little beach where they'd given the saltwater baths, and made their way directly into the village.

The village had been nearly razed. Smoke still rose from the remains of nearly every house. Only two or three buildings were still left standing. A few villagers were clustered here and there, talking, crying, or trying to move some of the rubble out of the road.

Jack looked closer: some of the "rubble" they were moving were dead villagers. The smell of rot was beginning to fill the air, already hard to breathe because of the smoke. Gibbs took out his handkerchief and breathed through it.

They came across one lad, around fourteen, attempting to move a charred beam from across the doorway of his house. "Here, lad, let me help," Jack offered. Together they heaved it away and the boy pushed the door open. Smoke billowed out and the boy coughed and waved it away as he tried to peer inside. He made to step in, but Gibbs grabbed him. "Son, the roof is about to cave in. It's not safe to go in there."

"But—but me mum was in there," the boy replied, his voice quavering. "I just wanted to see—I just wanted to make sure—"

Jack ducked his head and looked in. He came out again, shaking his head. "The inside is completely burned. If your mother was in there, she didn't survive, lad. I'm sorry."

The boy's face crumpled for a moment, but he didn't cry. He squared his shoulders. "Thank you for checking, sir," he said.

"Have you got anyone else you can go to?" Gibbs asked.

"Aye, me dad's alive." There was a note of cynicism in the boy's voice. "He's down the pub, like always."

"Can you show us where the pub is?" Gibbs asked. He muttered to Jack, "We'll be able to find out what happened there."

The boy led them down a side street, picking through the rubble of fallen beams and charred rafters. "What's your name, lad?" Jack asked him.

"Tommy Hound, sir" he said.

Jack stopped short. "Your mother was Mrs Thomas Hound?" he asked urgently.

"Aye. You know 'er? Everyone does. Did, I mean."

"No, but my friend Mrs Turner did."

"Oh, the pirate lady who lives on the hill?"

"Pirate lady?" Jack questioned, exchanging alarmed glances with Gibbs.

The boy nodded and tried to smile. "Aye, she tells us boys pirate stories when she comes down on market day. She'll not be very popular around here after this, though."

"Why, what happened here?"

The boy looked at him like he was a lunatic. "Pirate attack, o' course. Here's the pub, sir. Me dad's probably in there, if you want to talk to him." He waved them toward the door of a building that was only half-burned, and trudged onward, shrugging off their thanks.

Pirate attack? Here? Jack and Gibbs exchanged bewildered glances and shook their heads.

Jack pushed open the door and went in. Gibbs followed. There were only a few people in there, but they were more than happy to tell the two men what had happened. Pirates had sailed into the port in the dead of night, the night before last. They had been merciless—they had sacked the entire town, looted and burned most of the houses, and killed the majority of the villagers.

"Why, though?" Jack asked. "Last I knew, this wasn't a rich settlement or anything. What would they get out of it?"

The innkeeper shrugged his shoulders. "Don't know. It seemed like their leader was looking for something, and when she didn't find it, she just lost her temper and went insane."

"'She'?" Jack asked. "The pirate leader was a 'she'?"

The innkeeper nodded. "Odd, innit? You don't see many lady pirates. 'Ceptin' Mrs Turner up the hill, of course, but she only tells stories. She probably didn't even survive the attack."

A short, slight man with a sneer interrupted. "Mrs Turner," he announced, "was dying of a fever, and was no better than she ought to be, anyway."

Jack turned slowly. "And you are?"

"Hound."

"Ah. You're the one who allowed Mrs Turner to die of a fever, by refusing to let your wife visit and tend her. I know about you."

"Aye, she would have infected the whole village!" Hound blustered.

"Not that it matters now," Gibbs put in, looking disgusted. "From the look of things, an infection would have been kinder."

"It was probably her and her pirate stories that called the pirates here in the first place!" Hound said.

Jack clenched his fists, and Gibbs put a quelling hand on his shoulder.

"Here, what's your interest in Mrs Turner?" Hound asked Jack with a leer. "You the one fathered her bastard?"

Jack inhaled slowly through his nose. "Her legitimate son was fathered by her husband, Will Turner, who is a good friend of mine. That is my interest in Mrs Turner, God rest her soul."

Hound shrugged, sniffed, and walked off. They saw him a moment later, flirting with the barmaid who was resisting his advances with disgust. Hound grabbed her and tried to pull her back when she walked away.

That was it for Jack.

He stalked over, Gibbs following in his wake. Jack grabbed Hound by the shoulder and spun him around. "Your wife's body isn't even cold yet. The embers of your house are still burning. Your son is walking the streets alone, grieving for her, and you're in here drinking, gossiping, and trying to get in with other women!" He gave Hound a hard, swift uppercut to the jaw.

The man dropped.

Jack nursed his wrist and hand. "Ouch!" he muttered.

The innkeeper poured him a drink. "On the house, with Flimwell's compliments," he said. "Man's a menace to decent society everywhere!"

"Ta," Jack said, and downed the drink. "Anything else you can tell us about the attack? What the leader looked like? What ship it was?"

"They weren't English," the innkeeper said. "Their leader was jabbering at them in some other language. She was a looker, all right—long, black hair, big hat with a big feather in it. She didn't do any of the dirty work herself, but her men did their share and hers besides. I've seen things now, that I never..." he let his voice trail off and shook his head. "Must be more than fifty people dead, and we only had around seventy-five residents to start with."

"Well, thank you for your time, thanks for the drink," Jack said politely. "We were just passing through, but if we can send help, we will."

"Thank ye kindly, sir. We surely need all the help we can get," the landlord said sadly.

The two men headed back to the boat.

"One thing's certain," Gibbs said. "Miss Elizabeth can't stay here."

"Aye," Jack agreed. "We'll head back to the Pearl and pick her up so she can go up to her house and get what she needs from there."

When they got back to the Pearl, Gibbs tied up the boat but didn't raise it. Jack climbed up onto the ship, where Elizabeth and Agatha were waiting at the rail for him.

"Jack, what happened? What did you find out?" Elizabeth demanded.

"Pirate attack. Village is burned. Most of the villagers killed," Jack said shortly.

Agatha gasped.

"Pirate attack?" Elizabeth exclaimed. "In New Flimwell? Why?"

"No idea, love. Someone in the village said something about them looking for something, but that's all we found out."

"It's just—there's no reason to attack New Flimwell. They don't have anything. Fish and goats and that's about all. Will and I chose that location specifically because it wouldn't be of any interest to pirates."

"Well, you're interesting to pirates, darling," Jack said.

"Me?"

"Aye. I personally find you fascinating," he said with a flirtatious grin, and then sobered. "But all the pirate lords know you're the pirate king. That in itself makes you a 'person of interest,' even in a poky little spot like Flimwell. Now go change into something useful, eh? You have to come back with me and see what you can get out of your cottage. You and your aunt aren't staying here, that's for sure, and since everyone there believes you dead and I saw no reason to disabuse them of the notion, you won't be going back there, either. So you'll get whatever you can save, and we'll skedaddle."

"Right," Elizabeth said crisply, and disappeared into Jack's cabin.

"If it weren't my niece, is there anything else someone might be interested in?" Agatha asked the captain.

"Don't know, ma'am. It makes no sense. Not only was it a pointless waste of a perfectly good settlement—not to mention settlers—but there's no profit in it, see?"

"I see," Agatha replied.

"Only other possibility I can think of is... well, something I don't care to think of," he admitted.

"Will's heart?" Elizabeth asked, emerging from the cabin dressed in her breeches, shirt, waistcoat, and hat.

"Will's heart," he replied with a grimace. "Let's go." He nodded to Agatha and gestured for Elizabeth to climb down first.