Chapter 20
The Pearl's hull groaned as it scraped against something unseen beneath the water's surface, a reef or rock, perhaps, but more likely something conjured by the Locker itself. A great shudder rippled through the ship, a jarring lurch that left the crew clutching at railings and ropes to steady themselves.
The fog still clung thick to the air, but now it swirled in ragged patches, torn apart by the currents of the sea and the invisible force drawing them toward the shore. Through the fractured mist, dark shapes loomed ahead, an island, twisted and foreboding, its shoreline littered with decayed wreckage like the bleached bones of dead leviathans.
Here it was. The land of the lighthouse. Kate's Hell.
Cutler's boots hit the sand with a heaviness that pulled at his soul. The moment he stepped onto the darkened shore, it was as if the air itself thickened, weighing down every breath. His eyes flicked over the landscape, his jaw clenched tight enough to ache.
The land before them stretched out like a fevered dream as the rest followed him. Mangled trees twisted in shapes that defied nature, their trunks bent at impossible angles. Gnarled roots broke through the sand, clawing at the air like skeletal fingers. And everywhere, the scent of decay mingled with salt, sharp and bitter.
'Well,' Jack muttered, his fingers twitching restlessly where they hung at his sides. 'If this ain't a welcoming sight, I don't know what is.'
Elizabeth folded her arms, her gaze sharp as it swept over the darkened shore. The land seemed to writhe beneath the fog, its contours uneven and twisted, like the crumbled remains of some ancient city drowned by the sea and spat back up to rot in the air.
'This place..' Elizabeth murmured, her voice low. 'It feels wrong.'
'Feels exactly like the Locker should,' Barbossa replied, his grin tight and humorless. 'Twisted, cruel, and altogether forsaken'
'It's more than that,' Elizabeth insisted. 'It's personal'
Jack's eyes flickered to Cutler, whose back remained rigid, gaze fixed on the flickering orange beam still cutting through the fog like a blade. Its glow was weak, like the last embers of a fire struggling against the encroaching dark.
They disembarked cautiously, their boots sinking into the dark, damp sand. The air was heavy, thickened with something far worse than mere moisture. A stillness that crawled beneath the skin.
Cutler marched ahead of them, the compass gripped so tightly in his hand that the wooden edges cut into his palm. He flicked the latch open and shut, again and again, like a man lost in his own feverish ritual.
Jack watched him from the corner of his eye, a crease forming in his brow. 'He's going to break his own bloody hand if he keeps that up.'
'Can you blame him?' Elizabeth countered. 'If what you said is true, if she's been awake all this time..' she stopped at her own words when she suddenly recognized something.
It was Elizabeth who spotted the first sign.
'Wait,' she said, her voice tight as she crouched beside a patch of twisted flowers clawing its way up through the cracked earth. She reached out, fingers hovering above the tangled mass of dead flowers, her gaze sharp and haunted.
Jack quirked an eyebrow, his tone light despite the unease settling over him. 'Lizzy, if you're planning on gardening now, I'd say you've picked the worst place imaginable.'
Cutler halted his desperate march, being a few steps ahead of them, with the stubborn determination of a man refusing to be distracted.
'What is it?' Cutler snapped, ignoring Jack's teasing, his words barbed and impatient. His eyes never strayed from the path ahead, fixed on something only he could see.
Elizabeth's eyes narrowed, her tone strained. 'You know exactly what it is, don't you?'
Cutler stilled, but didn't turn to look. He kept his gaze trained forward, his shoulders tense and rigid.
'Peonies,' Elizabeth continued, her voice pressing into him like a blade. 'Kate's flowers. Her favorite.'
'You think I didn't already notice?' said Cutler, ever observant. His voice was clipped, every word choked with strain. 'You think I can't see what this place is already trying to do?'
Elizabeth tore a brittle stem from the ground, holding it out in her palm like an accusation. The petals were shriveled and blackened, their edges curled in decay. Thorns wound along the stalks, twisted, unnatural things that dug into her skin even as she tried to avoid them. A small drop of blood beaded along her finger.
'They're everywhere,' she said, her voice low and urgent. 'Growing wild and dead all at once. Like a plague. Like thorns meant to strangle everything else.'
Cutler's jaw tightened, but he refused to look at the flowers. Refused to acknowledge the way they spread across the ground like a carpet of dying memories, tangled and rotten.
But Elizabeth pressed on, her words relentless. 'You know what they mean. You can't just keep ignoring it.'
'I'm not ignoring anything,' Cutler growled. 'I'm moving forward. Because if I stop to linger on every piece of this twisted mockery, then I'm letting it win. And I refuse to let this place break me.'
'Don't be bloody stubborn' Jack's voice moved from behind Elizabeth. 'You think charging through this nightmare like a man possessed is going to save her? You think turning a blind eye to every sign laid out in front of you is the way to find her?'
Cutler's nostrils flared.
'Don't speak as if you understand' Cutler hissed, his eyes away from the flowers that had haunted him for years. Every peony rose he had witnessed in the last thirteen years he had ignored. He had wished before, every time he came face to face with the beauty of this flower, that it would burn, crumble, or rot like the ones here in this land did. But now, seeing it, Cutler begged for nothing more than this rotten sea of blush pedals to grow, live, and bloom by the rays of the sun. But here there was no sun, no light. Only death.
Cutler turned away from them, his stride fierce and deliberate as he pushed further along the twisted, overgrown path. But Barbossa, Elizabeth, and Jack kept pace, their eyes drawn to the signs Cutler refused to see. The flowers were everywhere, their thorns growing thicker the deeper they ventured. Creeping up stone walls and entwining themselves around shattered fences like a vicious snare.
And then came the books.
Elizabeth again was the first to notice them, or so she thought as Cutler might not be willing to face them, scattered pages charred around the edges, the ink smeared and faded. Torn covers, cracked spines. They littered the ground like fallen leaves, some buried beneath dead petals, others half-consumed by mud and rot.
She knelt down, fingers trembling as she reached for one of the books. The cover was scorched, the title nearly unreadable. But she recognized the worn leather, the gold leaf lettering—remnants of the small library Kate had kept in her home.
'These..' Elizabeth's voice was strained, almost pleading. 'These are hers. Her books. The ones she collected for years.'
'It's all hers,' Jack muttered, his gaze sweeping over the wreckage with an unease that couldn't be masked by his usual bravado. 'Every last piece of this place is a reflection of her. And you're walking past it all like it's nothing.' Jack looked up at Cutler, not sure he even heard him.
Cutler continued on, his steps quickening as if to outrun the truth. He refused to look at the books, at the flowers, at the things that clawed at his memory with every agonizing step.
But then something caught his eye. A glimmer of light, faint and fractured, buried beneath his black boot that made it sink into the sand. He couldn't ignore it, almost like he felt the heat of the object burn through the leather of his boot.
Cutler's breath hitched. His hand trembled as he reached down, fingers closing around a thin gold chain tangled in the mess. He drew it free, dust and ash spilling from the broken links.
It was her necklace. The one he had given her all those years ago. A delicate gold chain with an emerald pendant, one of the few possessions she treasured above all else.
The emerald was cracked clean down the middle, the split running jagged and sharp like a wound.
Cutler's knees buckled, his breath catching as he stared at the broken gemstone. His fingers trembled, clutching the necklace so tightly the edges bit into his skin.
'She wouldn't have left this behind,' he whispered, his voice hollow and lost. Elizabeth, Jack, and Barbossa arrived just behind him. Elizabeth still holding onto one of the blush peonies that wasn't as damaged as the rest. For a moment Elizabeth had wondered why some peonies weren't rotten or decaying, but she let the thought linger shortly when she watched Cutler holding the necklace.
'It's broken,' Cutler choked out. 'The emerald.. It's..'
'Like everything else in this place,' Barbossa said grimly. 'Twisted, shattered. Turned into something that's meant to tear you apart.'
But Cutler wasn't listening. His eyes were fixed on the pendant, his mind lost to a thousand memories of Kate's laughter, her voice, her touch. The way she had always worn the necklace, even when all the riches of the world meant nothing to her.
His hand closed around it, the chain digging into his palm. Suddenly he took a step forward, his vision blurring, his eyes wet but no tears came, he refused. His pace quickened, each step frantic, desperate.
Jack and Elizabeth exchanged a look just behind where Barbossa was standing looking ahead with his binoculars, worry etched into their faces. But they followed, keeping their distance, their eyes fixed on Cutler's retreating form.
The air grew colder as they pressed on, a chill that seeped into their bones and made the hairs along their necks stand on end. Every step seemed to thud with unnatural heaviness, the ground beneath their boots brittle and fragile, as if the very earth was decaying.
Cutler still walked ahead of them, his stride relentless, like a man desperate to outrun the ghosts clawing at his heels. His hand clutched the broken necklace, the shattered emerald sitting in his hold. Little blood smeared his fingers where the chain had cut into his skin, but he barely noticed.
Elizabeth, Jack, and Barbossa kept their distance, their expressions drawn and wary. The wildness in Cutler's eyes made it difficult to approach him, his refusal to acknowledge what lay strewn across the ground and clinging to every twisted branch making their own nerves fray.
They had passed more signs of Kate's personal hell, burned books with pages scattered like dying leaves, the spines broken and splintered, ink bleeding across the parchment. Some pages clung to the thorns of the dead peonies like messages pinned by cruelty itself.
The further they walked, the worse it grew.
The flowers were choking everything now, sprouting from every crack and crevice, their blackened petals wilting and falling away only to be replaced by more. The thorns tangled around wooden beams, tore through scraps of cloth, wrapped themselves around everything like barbed chains.
And always the scent of rot. Sickly-sweet and suffocating.
Jack's voice cut through the quiet, thick with discomfort. 'It's like a bloody graveyard of all she ever loved.'
Elizabeth nodded mutely, her gaze on Cutler's back, absentminded to the signs around him, or perhaps deliberately ignoring them as he said so earlier. Like a shield Cutler was still trying to hold up. Elizabeth wondered how long he would last.
The fog thickened and thinned in waves, sometimes curling close around them like grasping hands, other times parting to reveal the blackened landscape ahead. And then, just as they crested a small rise littered with debris and dead flora, they saw it.
Nassau.
Or rather, what remained of it.
Elizabeth drew in a sharp breath, her hand flying to her mouth as she stared. 'God..'
The town lay sprawled before them like a dying beast, gutted and left to rot. Buildings were half-collapsed and charred, their walls scorched black as if a firestorm had swept through. Roofs had caved in, beams splintered and protruding like broken bones.
What was once vibrant and bustling had been reduced to ruin. Ash clung to the air, swirling around them with every step they dared to take forward. It was thick and suffocating, settling over everything like a burial shroud.
Cutler had gone utterly still, his eyes wide and unblinking as he gazed upon the devastation. His breath came shallow and quick, his fingers gripping the broken necklace.
'Nassau,' he rasped, his voice cracking beneath the weight of his horror. 'What have they done?'
Jack's usual flippant demeanor had drained away, leaving his expression grim and haunted. 'What she's done, more like. Or rather, what's been done to her.'
'It's her memory,' Elizabeth whispered, her voice trembling. 'Twisted and torn apart.'
Cutler stumbled forward, his eyes darting from one ruin to the next. Every corner, every alley seemed familiar to him, and yet grotesquely altered. As if someone had taken a brush dipped in poison and painted his happiest memories into something grotesque.
The dock where he had first arrived before he had been be swept up in her beautiful world, when he was back into her life after those seven years apart. It lay in splinters, the planks shattered and rotting. The ships were rotting and tilted to their sides. The fort of the island was damaged beyond repair. The town, the fields, the beach, so many memories where they've walked through together.
And still, Cutler pressed on, his steps faltering but unrelenting. He was looking for something.
Anything.
They reached the center of the town, where the grand estates once stood proud and pristine. But nothing remained untouched by ruin. The gardens had withered, twisted flowers blooming only to die before their petals could fall. The fountains were choked with ash and bramble, the water nothing but stagnant filth. And then Cutler saw it.
The mansion.
Or what remained of it.
Once a gleaming beacon of elegance, Kate's home now lay in ruins. Its walls scorched, the grand pillars that had flanked the entrance cracked and toppled. The staircase had collapsed inward, the roof torn open to reveal the sickly grey sky above.
The air around the mansion was colder, as if the ruin itself exhaled a chill that settled into their bones. The flowers were thickest here, their thorns twisting around the blackened beams and clawing their way up the shattered remains of the doorway.
Cutler moved toward the ruins with frantic desperation, his breathing ragged. His eyes darted over the wreckage as if searching for something that had survived the destruction.
'Kate..' he whispered, his voice broken.
Elizabeth took a hesitant step forward, her expression torn between sympathy and terror. 'Maybe we should—'
But Cutler ignored her. He stumbled over rubble, his hands trembling as he sifted through the wreckage. Pieces of furniture lay scattered, charred and splintered. Curtains that had once billowed gracefully in the breeze now hung in shreds, stained and rotting.
He saw paintings that had been torn from their frames, canvases slashed and defiled. Pieces of sculptures scattered like bones, their delicate features ground to dust.
And all the while, the broken necklace hung from his fingers, the shattered emerald swaying like a pendulum with every frantic movement.
Jack watched him, his brow furrowed, his usual mask of sarcasm shattered. 'He's tearing himself apart, Lizzy.'
'But he's too stubborn to break,' Jack continued murmuring, but his voice lacked conviction. His dark eyes were fixed on Cutler, his brow furrowed.
Cutler pushed through the last of the rubble, his gaze wild, searching for something, anything, that might have survived the nightmare. His knees buckled when he reached what remained of the garden. A place once filled with roses and peonies now strangled by thorns and rot.
He heard Kate's laughter in his mind, felt her fingers entwine with his as they walked those grounds long ago. Her smile, her voice, so alive, so real. The phantom of her presence clung to him like smoke.
He forced himself to keep standing, his legs shaking, the broken necklace still clutched in his fist. Without a word, he turned and marched away from the ruins.
'Where are you going?' Elizabeth called after him, but he didn't answer.
He stumbled forward as if drawn by some unseen force. His mind was a storm, his breath shallow and fast. The images of Kate's home in ruins tore at him, ripped him apart from the inside. His legs moved on their own, away from the mansion, away from the twisted remnants of Nassau.
It was as though something was pulling him. He stumbled past the bramble and twisted peonies, their thorns clawing at his coat. The path ahead was broken, uneven, but his steps were relentless.
Jack and Elizabeth exchanged a look before following him, with Barbossa still behind them, almost in his own world probably shaken by the sheer horror of it all too. Their hesitation lost to the knowledge that Cutler was spiraling deeper and deeper into the dark.
They caught up to him at the docks, where the fog clung thick and cold around the wooden planks. Old, rotting ships bobbed aimlessly in the current, their hulls splintered and sails torn.
One vessel loomed above the rest, its silhouette sharp and jagged against the sky. The name etched along the back in faded letters was unmistakable.
"Le Requin."
Cutler eyes widened. 'No.. it can't be.'
The ship. The ship of not only Kate's, but his own nightmares too. The ship that they had been held captive on by the rouge pirates.
Jack's gaze flickered nervously over the ship's battered hull. 'Bloody hell'
But Cutler was already moving, his steps dragging him up the gangplank. His breaths came shallow, his heart thundering in his chest. Memories clawed their way to the surface, breaking through his mind like shattered glass.
Cutler almost didn't have it in him to move aboard his own nightmare, here right in front of him. But by the slightest chance of hope, that Kate might be here, as he had promised himself to search every single corner of this Hell, he'd do it. He would move aboard the ship he swore to never step foot on again.
Cutler ignored it, for now. But the trauma that had festered inside of him for so long, came back slowly but surely.
The inside halls of the Le Requin was cold and damp. The scent of mildew thick in the air, mingling with the ghostly echoes of pain and despair. The walls were slick with moisture, and the dim light from above only deepened the shadows that coiled around the corners like living things. Cutler's fists clenched as he descended the narrow stairway. His body felt heavy, his legs numb.
His vision blurred as his own memories and Kate's hellish reality twisted together.
The darkness was suffocating. His breaths came faster, his chest constricting. He remembered this place all too well. He remembered the chains. The cold iron biting into his wrists, the rough hemp rope cutting into his ankles. He remembered the cruel laughter of the pirates as they beat him, over and over, until his skin split and his bones groaned under the force.
The agony so deep it had made him wish for death.
The blood. His own blood, pooling beneath him.
But worse than the pain had been the knowledge that Kate was nearby, locked away in the darkness. Helpless. Terrified.
He had failed her then. Just as he had failed her now.
Jack, Elizabeth, and Barbossa's voices were distant, muffled by the roaring in his ears. The heat of rage burned under his skin, but it was the helplessness that froze his limbs.
Jack's boots splashed in the muck as he and Elizabeth moved carefully through the narrow passage. The iron bars of the cells were streaked with rust, thick as veins, and the walls pulsed with a living darkness. Elizabeth clutched her arms to her chest, her eyes flickering between the rows of cells, her breathing shallow. 'I don't like this place,' she murmured, her voice tight and small. 'It feels.. heavy.'
Jack's expression was uncharacteristically solemn. The perpetual smirk was gone, replaced by something pensive and raw. His gaze wandered over the grisly scene before him, his fingers twitching nervously at his side.
'This place ain't just heavy, love,' Jack replied, his voice low. 'It's rotten. More than the others.' He scanned the brig, eyes narrowing at the bloodstains painted across the planks, splattered like grotesque murals. Some of it dried to a dark, crusted brown, but other patches gleamed wetly, fresh and vibrant. As if the place had been torn open and left to bleed.
'It's like something.. something terrible happened here.' Elizabeth swallowed, her gaze following the crimson streaks across the floor. 'Or is happening.'
'You don't know what this is, do you? What this place is showing us?' Jack whispered asking Elizabeth, holding the cell door sideways, staring at Cutler standing in the middle of the prison, frozen.
Elizabeth looked at him, her brow furrowed with confusion.
Jack's dark eyes almost faltered like a painful memory came to pass but with a rare sharpness to them. 'Kate told me once, a long time ago. About how she and Cutler first crossed paths, how they met,' Jack began, his voice rasping like the scrape of metal against stone. 'Captured by rouge pirates. Just the two of them. Bound aboard this very ship for weeks, Le Requin.'
Elizabeth's eyes widened. 'They were here? Both of them?'
'Aye,' Jack nodded, his fingers brushing absently over one of the rusted iron bars. 'Held captive. Cutler was tortured for weeks. And you know him. After that, his blood was doomed to turn colder than the sea itself. But it was her, Kate.. who kept him alive. Tended to his wounds. Kept him from losing his mind.'
Elizabeth felt her stomach twist, her hand resting instinctively against her belly. 'I didn't know.. I had no idea.'
'She told me,' Jack continued, his voice growing quieter. 'But not all of it. Not enough to paint the whole picture, just pieces of it, like broken glass.'
He looked over at Cutler, who was standing several feet away, his back to them. The man was as still as stone, his gaze locked on something they couldn't see.
'They were both damaged by it, more than she ever wanted to admit. But it's him who carries the worst of it. The pain. The madness.'
Elizabeth's hand trembled. 'That's why he's..'
'Lost,' Jack finished grimly. 'This place, it's tearing him apart. It's dragging him back through his own bloody nightmare'
They both looked at Cutler then, his shoulders hunched, his body held together by sheer willpower alone. The broken necklace still clutched in his hand, his knuckles white.
The floor beneath him was drenched in blood, pooling thick and viscous around his boots. But he seemed not to notice.
Elizabeth took a step forward. 'Cutler.. you need to..'
'No!' Cutler's voice snapped like a whip, his eyes wild and frenzied. His breathing was ragged, his entire frame trembling as if the air itself were clawing at him. 'We must keep going.. I must keep going.'
Jack and Elizabeth exchanged a glance, their concern deepening. The haunted look in Cutler's eyes was not new, but it had sharpened, his pupils blown wide and frantic. He was unraveling, thread by thread.
'He's being eaten alive by this place,' Elizabeth whispered, her voice shaking. 'And if we don't do something..'
Cutler suddenly felt to his knees after he had been staring back at something no one else saw. He was mumbling something unintelligible, like he was actually loosing his mind. Fully staring at his hands now, one still holding the compass and the other the necklace. It was obvious Cutler witnessed his hands covered in his own blood, but to the rest it wasn't there.
'He's already gone, Lizzy,' Jack cut her off, his gaze never leaving Cutler.
'Lost to the weirds of the Locker. And the further we go.. the worse it's gonna get.'
'We have to do something,' Elizabeth insisted, her eyes glassy with desperation. 'If we don't..'
But Jack's eyes darkened. 'If we don't, he'll take us all down with him.'
The words were harsh, but Elizabeth saw the fear etched into Jack's face. For once, the pirate's bravado was stripped away, leaving only bare, bleeding truth. 'And so will Kate be lost forever' Jack continued, returning a little of the warmth inside his voice.
But Cutler was far beyond hearing them. His mind was locked in a vice, twisted by the relentless horrors of the Locker. The nightmare held him tightly, refusing to release its hold.
He stumbled up and forward, his boots splashing through the blood-soaked floor. His eyes darted from shadow to shadow, as if expecting to see something emerge from the darkness.
The blood called to him. The wounds of the past opened fresh and raw, painting the brig with the suffering he had endured. Every strike of the whip, every savage blow, echoed through his bones, his flesh remembering the pain with cruel clarity.
His heart pounded, his breath coming in short, gasping bursts.
Then he heard it.
A voice.
Singing.
Soft and pure, threading through the darkness like a beam of silver light. It drifted on the air, so faint it was almost nothing. But Cutler heard it. His breath hitched, the sound lodging itself deep within his chest. Another note followed, lilting and gentle, a melody weaving itself together with aching grace.
A song.
Familiar.
So impossibly familiar.
Cutler's head snapped up, his eyes wide and glassy as if waking from a fever dream. His heartbeat thundered in his chest, but something inside him steadied. His grip on the bars loosened.
And the song grew stronger.
It filled the hollowed brig like sunlight breaking through a shattered roof. The purity of the sound washed over them all, chasing away the stink of blood and rot, banishing the echoes of violence. The notes rose and fell, swirling around them like a warm embrace.
Elizabeth's lips parted, her eyes brimming with awe. 'Is that..?'
Jack's expression twisted, his throat working to form words that refused to come. Instead, he only nodded, his gaze searching the shadows with something close to reverence.
Even Barbossa appeared taken aback, his usual cynicism fractured by the haunting beauty of the song. 'Who's voice it that?,' he muttered under his breath.
Cutler staggered forward, his legs trembling but his steps driven by something stronger than the agony of memory.
'It's her voice.. Kate's voice' Cutler whispered, barely able to speak.
It drifted through the darkness, unwavering and crystalline.
It was the same song she had sung to him once before, aboard this very ship. A lifetime ago. When he'd been left battered and broken, his mind on the verge of crumbling. When her voice alone had kept him anchored to life. A time when the pirates had beaten him so badly, that they'd both not known if he'd survive the night.
He remembered her cradling his head on her chest, her fingers threading softly through his hair as she sang. The melody had been a lullaby, the only softness in a world gone sharp and cruel. He remembered the warmth of her presence, the way she had whispered to him between songs to keep him awake, to keep him alive.
Now, the song was different. It was fuller, richer, laced with an otherworldly strength that transcended the terror of the Locker. There was no agony in it, no desperation. Only light.
'This place,' Jack rasped, his eyes still darting through the shadows. 'It's not meant to show us something like that.'
Elizabeth's gaze remained fixed on Cutler. 'But it is,' she whispered. 'We've only seen pain and fear, destruction, decay. But this.. this is something else. Something pure.'
'Aye, well,' Barbossa scoffed, though his voice had softened. 'The Locker's a cruel thing. But perhaps it's not a complete bastard.'
Cutler's eyes glistened, his chest heaving as the song enveloped him. For a moment, he couldn't speak. His voice had abandoned him, his throat tight with emotion. But the fire inside him, the one that had been burning so weakly, so close to extinguishing, now it roared to life. The warmth of her voice reached him like a hand extended through darkness.
A lifeline. And he seized it.
'Why?' Elizabeth's voice quivered. 'Why would a place like this allow us to hear something so.. beautiful?'
Jack shook his head, the crease between his brows deepening. 'It shouldn't. That kind of light.. it doesn't belong here.'
'But it's here' Elizabeth insisted. 'It's her, Jack. It's Kate calling out again, like she did with the lighthouse. She's still fighting. Still reaching out to us.'
Jack let out a breath, his shoulders sagging. 'Seems to me she's saving him from the edge.' He cast a glance at Cutler. 'And maybe all of us, at that.'
Cutler was scarcely listening. The song had wrapped itself around him, chasing away the shadows that had been closing in. The pain was still there, rooted deep, but her voice gave him the strength to stand against it.
He took another step forward, his fingers tracing along the rusted bars of the brig. His mind sharpened, his focus narrowing to that melody. His pulse steadied, each beat synchronized to the rhythm of her voice.
Kate was here.
Reaching out to them. To him.
And that realization cut through the madness like a blade of purest silver.
'We need to move,' Cutler said suddenly, his voice clear and strong. It shocked the others, the ferocity of his resolve. 'She's waiting for us.'
Barbossa nodded, his eyes determined. 'Right. Then best we not keep the lady waiting.'
Jack's grin was grim but genuine. 'Seems you got your fire back, Cutler. Good. We'll be needin' it soon enough.'
Elizabeth smiled, her gaze flickering between them all. 'Then let's go. Before the Locker tries to take it away again.'
The song continued, guiding them forward, pulling them from the darkness. Cutler's breath relieved him of the pain from only minutes ago, and it made him quicken his feet, pulling himself upstairs away from the brig, away from the horrible memory.
Whatever Kate had endured, whatever hell had been carved from her own mind, she was still fighting.
And so would he.