Hiya!
It's been a while... To cut a long story short, my laptop broke, which means I have things written down on paper, but not yet typed up. That means I should be posting quite a lot quite soon (but I also have exams to pass too, haha) I'll be updating A Sparrow's Eye View in the next couple of days for sure, as I'm halfway through typing that chapter up.
Hope you're all well :)

"But whyyyyy?" Rebecca leaned on the window with a look of big frustration on her small face. She was either a very intuitive child or she had gotten to know me extremely well over an incredibly short space of time, but she just knew that I was as drawn to the docks as she was.

"Because," I sighed at how familiar this sentence was becoming to me. "James wouldn't allow it."

No matter how many times she'd heard me say it, the words always seemed to produce a fresh scowl from her. She scrunched up her nose

"Soooo…" Rebecca tilted her head to one side and looked up at me with a cheeky grin and a twinkle in her eyes. "… don't tell him?"

I sighed although I really wanted to laugh.

"He'd find out sweetheart," I said. "People here… they talk. They talk a lot. And what do you think they would say if they saw us down at the docks, or worse, on board, a pirate ship? Especially with me as the Commodore's sister and you as his-"

I stopped. The word 'neice' was slowly forming on my lips. I licked it away and closed my mouth. I swallowed and the sound was far louder than I meant it to be. Perhaps I should have listened to James a little more when he warned me not to get attached to her. Was I already thinking of her as family?... As my brother's niece and therefore… my daughter? "His what?" Rebecca asked and although her voice was dripping with innocence I felt hugely uncomfortable.

"Charge," the word burned my throat like bile, like a lie. I hoped the word didn't hurt her. It didn't seem to. Her smile was small, but it was there. She wrinkled up her nose and shook her head.

"James isn't in charge," she said. "You are."

I laughed at her naivety and wished that she were right. Neither of us was or ever would be in charge, she'd learn that. One day.

My brother's study door clicked shut and I turned quickly from the window, leaning on it as if it meant as little to me as a wall so that my body blocked out the light and hopefully our view of the docks. My heart sped up and I felt small and guilty. James and George were walking towards us. "Hello you two," James smiled. "Looking forward to this afternoon?"

I opened my mouth to reply with a 'no' and to voice my concerns over taking Rebecca to see something so violent, but before I could George clapped a firm hand on to my upper arm and silenced me with a confusingly radiant smile. "Of course they are," he said with an uncalled for amount of cheer in his voice. "The whole Port is abuzz with excitement and we have front-row seats."

Sometimes, when George spoke, there was a cold and slimy gleam in his eye that I didn't much like, but couldn't make sense of because once I had caught sight of it, it slithered back in to his iris and was replaced by something friendlier and less sincere. My skin was colder than it had been and I was acutely aware of the heat of his hand on my arm. I opened my mouth again, glancing down at little Rebecca, hoping I wouldn't have to actually put my fears about exposing her to a mass hanging at such a young age in to words in front of her. I hoped that either James or George would be able to pick up the hints from my expression and not allow her to attend. I remembered the first time that I had attended a hanging- had felt the excitement flow through my nose from the air around me and deposit butterflies in my stomach, had held my breath and waited for a monster when what I actually saw was a man, a human man, dangling and twisting at the end of a rope, which forced the butterflies turn on each other in my stomach and rise up as vomit- I shivered.

"Well," I began. "I just-"

"Anyway," George spoke over me as if I had never spoken at all. "It'll be good for young Rebecca, don't you think?"

The question was quite clearly directed at James and not me. James beamed back. "Of course."

I frowned a silent 'how?' in his direction. I wondered how he could forget the splat of my vomit on his shoes… and Rebecca was about two years younger now than I was then. James saw my look and reflected it back to me. "Come here a second, Izzy," he said and put a hand on my shoulder to guide me away from Rebecca. I glanced back to see George bending down to talk to her and caught sight of an angry frown on her face before it was blocked from my view by George's shoulder.

"James, I-"

"It has been brought to my attention," he started and I began to wonder if anyone could hear the start of my sentences today or if I had accidentally been thinking them instead of speaking. "That having Rebecca at the hanging today might be the perfect way to show her the reality of piracy. Especially since we don't know where she came from and… you know… it would be good to… just in case..."

"In case she's a pirate?" I whispered with narrowed eyes.

"People talk," James answered and his mouth shrank in to a thin line that told me he was finished with this conversation, despite the fact that I had only actually managed to complete one sentence so far. We stared at each other and I think he expected a fight from me, but I couldn't bring myself to talk. In his words I heard an echo of my own words to Rebecca earlier. People here… they talk. James turned and walked away. George straightened up and turned around to look at me.

"See you later?" he smiled. I could only nod and the two of them left the room.

I looked down at Rebecca and she looked back at me in a silent understanding. "Do you want to go? Do you want to go to the hanging, Rebecca?" I asked her. She nodded. I paused because once I'd said the words in my head there was no way that I could go back on it. She looked back at me, as if she knew there was a struggle in my head. I crouched down so that I could look her in the eye. "How about… Just before it… you and I go down to the docks?"

She inhaled sharply and bounced up on the balls of her feet. "Yesyesyes!" she said, and then, "Pleeeease!"

I wanted to smile at her, but I saw so much of myself in her that I was completely overwhelmed for a moment. She had that burning curiosity that James had tried to stamp out of me as a child. She held a fascination with the darker side of things that I couldn't help but relate to. And I had been trying to stop her in the way that James had to me. I hadn't been listened to and now I wasn't listening to her. Why? How? How could this child I had never met be so similar to me?

"Okay," I said and I felt as if I was giving myself permission to go down there and not her. There was a tight and angry knot in my stomach that had been tied by James and George. Rebecca beamed at me and I felt lighter.

Rebecca's hand was so small that I was worried it would slip out of mine every time I held it. Her large eyes blinked up at me and then seemed to get even larger when she looked at the dark sails moored in docks. I tried not to smile when I saw her face, I recognised the feeling that her look showed to me, because I had felt it before. I had felt it at her age, but it would not have been proper for me to betray that same feeling now. I didn't indulge it, but I didn't tell her off for it either. I ignored it, which is a good middle ground. "Look," she whispered and there was something about her smile that made me stop walking completely. Her eyes were still on the sails of the black pirate ship. There was something warm about the way she looked at them. Perhaps it was her smile. It unsettled me for a moment until I glanced at the ship too.

"What?" I asked, although my question seemed out of place. I could hardly see the hull of the Black Pearl for the crowd of people that stood in the way, but I could still appreciate the awe of it. There had been a crowd around it every time I passed- different people each time, but all drawn in by the same thing, the same twisted obsession.

"Look," she repeated and I saw that her obsession was different from theirs, less twisted.

"I know," I said because I knew exactly how her obsession felt- it was the same light and giddy flutter that I felt. Her hand squeezed mine very tightly and I felt her tug on it slightly in an attempt to pull me towards the ship. I didn't budge; there was a lump in my throat weighing me down. What was it? Fear? Sadness? It didn't make sense.

"What's it like?" Rebecca asked. The empty wheel of the abandoned ship didn't move and that seemed so wrong somehow. I was suddenly overwhelmed at the thought that it may never move again.

"What?" I asked, unable to look away.

"What's it like?" she asked. "On the ship?"

Several sentences sprang to mind- Have you never been on a ship before? I don't know about this one in particular, but I can tell you about others. How would I know about this one when I've never been on it? – but none of those were what I actually said. What I actually said was, "The wood isn't black because it was stained by blood, as James said it was. She's that colour because of a fire that burnt right through her and sunk her so that the only hope was to raise her from the depths."

I stopped what I was saying, but not because it felt as if my story was done- there were more words, they just wouldn't come. I didn't know what they were or where my answer to her had come from, but I was shivering. I expected an explosion of questions from Rebecca after a tale as exciting and far-fetched as the one that had tumbled out of my mouth, I know there were now many questions circling my own mind- what caused the fire? Was anyone hurt? Who had the power to raise such a ship- but Rebecca said nothing. When I looked down at her she was smiling at me. I smiled back and realised that my heart was racing and I didn't know why. I felt like I had a secret that had been cocooned in my chest that was only now starting to shake off the sleep and spread its wings.

I cleared my throat to try and dislodge the lump there. Rebecca tugged on my hand and I bent down to listen to her. "Can we go on it?" she asked in a whisper. I glanced over at the ship and saw that two of my brother's men, Murtogg and Mullroy, were standing guard of the gangplank. They weren't the brightest… I could probably get around them if I…

Something jolted in my brain and reminded me who I was, where I was and that there was no way that James would…

"Please?" Rebecca asked so quietly and so sweetly.

"We can try," I said and she didn't seem surprised by my words. I was. I was used to sneaking around under James's rules and small acts of defiance, but never with something as big as this. I straightened up and walked towards the galley of the Black Pearl as if I was supposed to be there.

"This dock is off-limits to civilians," Mullroy told me.

"I'm terribly sorry, "I said with as much authority as I could muster in my voice. "If I see one I will let you know immediately." The stared at me with their mouths hanging open like two dead fish. I cleared my throat again to stop it from shaking. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm looking for my brother."

"Um," Murtogg looked a little bit frightened of me. "I'm sorry Miss, I don't think the Commodore is up there."

I raised an eyebrow and saw him shrink a little. "How long have you two been on duty?" I asked.

"About an hour," Mullroy replied.

"Oh," I said coolly. "And I don't suppose that my brother could possibly have been up there before you got here?"

"Um, well…" Murtogg stumbled over his words.

"We don't know, Miss," Mullroy said, shooting his friend a look of annoyance.

"Well he is not at home and I could not find him at the Fort, so please stand aside and let me see if he is here," I said.

"Yes, Miss," Murtogg stood back, but Mullroy looked unsure.

"But Mr Watson said that she wasn't to-"

Mr Watson? George? What business did he have here?

"Am I to understand that you are taking George Watson's orders over those of your new Commodore?" I asked and he stopped talking immediately. He shook his head. I nodded. "Good."

Rebecca and I walked past them, up the gangplank and I could feel my hand shaking. Rebecca let out a tiny, almost inaudible squeal and I smiled in relief.

I stopped before setting foot on the deck and Rebecca stopped with me. I scanned the ship and felt my heart race. There were probably many reasons for this. The first being that I was on a pirate ship- a ship that had probably brought death and destruction to more people than I would probably ever meet in my lifetime. The second would be the eeriness of seeing a ship with no people. She looked empty and lonely and a little lost without her crew. But there was something deeper, a third reason that slipped tantalisingly away from me every time I came close to feeling it. It was shapeless and nameless and I couldn't place it.

After my slight hesitation I stepped forwards and walked right in to the middle. Rebecca let go of my hand. The mast stood before me and I was more drawn to it than I had been to any piece of any Navy vessel I had ever seen. Did this make me a terrible person? Was there something fundamentally wrong with me? I reached out and touched a part of it. A shiver ran from my hand, up my arm and through the entirety of my body. The corners of my eyes prickled.

"Can I ask you something?" Rebecca followed my steps closely as I walked to the rails of the Black Pearl and ran my fingertips gently along the wood. She was smoother than I thought she would be and without the coldness I had imagined came with all things that killed.

"Of course," I smiled at the lines in the wood that counted the age of the trees she'd been built from. I wondered if they were the same kind of tress that went in to building Navy ships. I wondered if it mattered.

"How did the fire start?" she asked and I stopped my absent-minded tracing of the spirals of wood rings on the Pearl to look at her.

"The fire?" I repeated. I tried to sound as natural as possible, even though my heart rate was suddenly through the roof. "What fire?"

"The one that turned the wood of Pearl black?"

"Um…" I stammered "… I don't know. I can't… I can't remember where I learnt that. I must have read it somewhere… or maybe…"

"Was it an accident?" Rebecca pressed and I felt suddenly as if I was under examination.

"No," I said without thinking and I knew my answer was an honest one.

I looked up at the black sails hanging limply from their dark masts, around at the railings, the stairs, the wheel and then finally at the Captain's Cabin. I wondered what was in there. And who should have been in there if my brother hadn't stopped it.

I didn't really decide to go in... it just sort of happened. One moment I was standing by the mast and the next my hand was resting on the handle of the Captain's Cabin. I turned it, thinking that it might be locked, but sort of knowing that it wouldn't be. It opened with ease and I let out a deep breath as the door opened. The Cabin was dark and I stepped in quickly, before I lost my nerve. The stillness unsettled me, I'd half-expected someone to be in there. It looked as if there should be. The place was a mess, but the kind of mess that would make sense to the person who lived there. Now nobody lived here and nobody ever would again. I walked over to the desk and looked down at a stranger's things and felt oddly sentimental.

"I drew a picture," Rebecca said and I jumped at the break in the silence.

"Oh darling, that's fantastic," I smiled. "You'll need to show it to me when we get home."

"I have it with me," she said, quite seriously and put her hands in the pocket of her little coat.

"You brought it with you?" I asked, puzzled as to why she would wait until now to show me it. She nodded and held out a folded piece of parchment. I took it from her and she watched expectantly as I unfolded it. I smiled wondering if it would be a picture of her, or her family or even of James and I. I had seen children's pictures before and knew not to expect too much, so I tried to freeze the smile on my face. When I saw her picture, though, I stopped smiling. I had to. I could only stare. For a moment, everything around me blurred into nothing. Even Rebecca was momentarily gone. My heart dropped to my stomach and flipped over.

"Rebecca…" my voice sounded small. "Where did you see this?" She looked up at me and said nothing, but she looked kind of… expectant. I felt a little bit dizzy and the air around me seemed heavier- refusing to enter my lungs. Perhaps there was a block in my throat. I swallowed. I swallowed again. "Rebecca where did you see this? I… I've dreamt about this… how… how did you…"

I frowned at her drawing of a gold medallion on the page- the same one that had featured heavily in a great many of my dreams, willing it to somehow disappear and be replaced by something a little more ordinary. Something that I child would draw. Rebecca touched the parchment. "You know it," she said.

"Yes," I nodded, treating her words like a question although they hadn't sounded like one when she'd spoken. "It's been in my dreams, where did you see this?" Rebecca remained silent. I knelt down. "Rebecca where did you see this?!"

She looked solemn, her eyes were big. "It wasn't a dream," she whispered.