Fic: "The Lost City" (4/5)
Title: The Lost City (4/5)
Author: cassyl
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Jack Sparrow/James Norrington
Summary: Jack’s search for a fabled map leads him on an adventure that may mean more than he ever bargained for.
Warnings: This is AU like whoa. I also want to point out that, although many locations in this story are based on real places, they are all fictionalized versions of themselves. Furthermore, no copyright infringement is intended.
THE LOST CITY
“There is a tide in the affairs of men Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune; Omitted, all the voyage of their life Is bound in shallows and in miseries . . .”
-- Shakespeare, Julius Caesar
CHAPTER FOUR
Once the brothers Smith had been bound and the younger Smith had been suitably revived, they were brought to Captain Águia’s cabin. The Portuguese captain was sitting behind his desk. He gave the impression of being at once very rich and quite Spartan. His cabin was generously appointed but forbidding, his jacket finely embroidered but dark, his tanned face handsome but stony. James took all this in with a dazed, glassy-eyed gaze, but Jack felt nothing but foreboding.
“I will not waste my words,” he said, his sharp, dark eyes sweeping over the two of them. “I want your map.”
“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about, Captain,” Jack replied breezily. “But my brother here’s a dab hand with a pen, I’ve no doubt he could sketch you up any sort of map you might need.”
“I thought it was not necessary to say, but perhaps I was mistaken,” Águia said. “I want your map and I won’t hesitate to kill you and search your corpse for it if you don’t capitulate.”
Jack saw James open his mouth. “Best to capitulate, then,” Jack said before James could say anything.
“I’m glad we understand each other.” Águia shuffled some papers on his desk needlessly, just to impress their unimportance on them. His dislike for the captain had grown immensely in the past two minutes. “My men are searching your cabin as we speak.”
Jack experienced a sudden surge of relief that he’d taken to carrying the map around in his breast pocket. “Ah, it’s good that you’ve detained us here in that case. Wouldn’t want to get in their way. Tell me, how long have you known?” Jack asked, buying himself time to think.
“Since Casa Branca. One of my men heard you discussing it at the inn.”
“Quite the loyal crew you have, Captain. If it were me who’d overheard that conversation, I’d have waited until the opportune moment to make my play, and I can’t say that I’d have involved the entire crew. Greater share with fewer men. But who’s to say that isn’t the case here and now?” Jack grinned over his shoulder at the large guard who stood behind him. “Best to keep mum until the time comes to strike, eh?”
Águia gave a brief nod to the guard, who promptly grabbed Jack’s shoulder and wrenched it sharply. Jack managed to bite back the shout that wanted to rise from his lips, but a sweat broke out all over his body. He heard something metal rattle-James’ manacles, he realized. “Don’t think you can talk your way out of this business,” the captain said. “I don’t take well to dissemblers.”
“No dissembling here, mate,” Jack gasped.
“I’m glad we understand each other. Now, I’ll thank you to tell me everything you know about the map.”
A silence stretched out in the cabin, and Jack realized that James was in no mood to comply. He shot the geographer a pointed look and lifted his eyebrows. James nodded slowly in response. None of this escaped the Portuguese’s meticulous attention.
James took a deep breath and seemed to pull himself up to his full height before he began to speak. “I bought the map in Cádiz from an antiques dealer,” James said, meeting Águia’s narrowed eyes with an expression of bland truthfulness. “He couldn’t tell me anything about it, except that it came from a sage in Tripoli. It came in a box of old coins-supposedly from the Lost City-and it was inside a gold case. That’s all I know.”
“And where is the map now?”
“It’s in the cabin,” Jack cut in. “James, where did you put it away last?”
James frowned. “I didn’t . . .”
“Yes,” Jack replied pointedly. “You did. I gave it to you and asked you to put it away.”
“No . . .” James spoke slowly, but Jack saw that he’d finally caught on. “I thought you put it away.”
“No, there’s no way, it was definitely-”
“Enough,” snapped Águia.
“Apologies, mate,” Jack said, bowing his head remorsefully. “In any case, it’s in the cabin, and I’ve the utmost faith that your loyal men will find it soon enough.”
“You’re very willing to divulge this information,” the captain said, unimpressed.
“Well, after all,” James replied, “we’ve just had a taste of what you’ve got in store for us if we don’t. Given the choice, most people wouldn’t choose to repeat the experience.”
“I’m afraid you mistake me,” Captain Águia said. “You will take me to Atlantis, and the only choice you have in the matter is whether, once I am done with you, you prefer a quick death, or a slow one.”
Jack couldn’t help laughing. “Not much of an incentive, is it?”
It seemed that the effort of holding himself upright during their audience with Águia had told on James, for once their escort had left them securely situated in the brig, he let himself slump against the floor. Presently Jack sat down beside him and said, “Let me have a look at that.”
James leaned forward obediently, and Jack scooted closer to examine the damage. There was blood in James’ hair, and he made a choked noise whenever Jack’s fingers ranged too close to the actual wound. The stillness of his body told Jack that James was holding his breath. When Jack finally withdrew his fingers, wiping them on his breeches, James let out a shaky sigh and said, “I think I’ll take the quick death.”
“Nobody’s dying yet, mate,” Jack replied, leaning back against the wall and motioning for silence. He listened for a moment, making sure that the creak of the hull was the only sound before he went on. “While Águia’s busy searching our trunks, we’ve got work to do.”
“Work?”
“I’ve got the map safe and sound.” He tapped his chest. “But it won’t be long before Águia realizes that. So before he does, we’ve got to get rid of it.”
This time, James didn’t bother to repeat Jack’s words, just stared at him with a look of dull shock.
“Well, obviously, we can’t keep it, or else he’ll find it and he’ll deduce, just as we did, where exactly that island is. We’ve looked at the map enough to know what’s what. And if the physical map is gone, there’s no way our friend Águia can call our bluff.”
“And what, exactly, is our bluff, Jack?”
“I think the less you know, mate, the better.”
James considered this for some time, before finally holding out his hand and saying, “Give me the map.”
Jack hesitated only a moment before he withdrew the cloth from his pocket and handed it to James. The geographer unfolded the map and paused a moment, regretful, looking for all the world like a priest about to desecrate his altar. But then James started ripping the stitches out of the cloth, using his teeth where he had to. Once the fabric was blank, he ripped it in two and held it out to Jack, saying, “Find somewhere to hide those.”
While James rested, Jack scuttled around their cell, squeezing the two bits of cloth into crannies in the floorboards. He returned to find James still brushing little scraps of thread into the pile of sawdust in the corner of the cell.
“How’s that head wound?” Jack asked.
“Oh, middling fair,” James replied with a strained smile.
Jack wasn’t sure what they’d do, but he knew they’d escape. It was just a matter of making it to the next opportune moment. So he smiled, and patted James on the back and said, “Don’t you worry, Jim, m’lad. I’ve wriggled my way out of worser scrapes than this. After all, compared to that time with the one-legged whore in Cartagena, this is nothing.”
That was how Jack waited, keeping James awake by telling him increasingly outrageous stories. And all the time, while he fabricated wild lies about Spanish whores and one-eyed rumrunners, he was wracking his brain, trying to think of a way to get out of this mess alive.
Of course, it was true that Jack had gotten himself out of bigger trouble than the trouble he was in now. But usually such daring escapes involved unexpected good fortune, and it seemed that Jack’s luck had been running a bit low recently.
Águia’s men had broken his second finger when Jack decided it would be a good idea to say, “There’s no need to push, mate, give me the pen.”
Holding his throbbing left hand close to his chest, he took the quill from the Portuguese captain and sketched the outline of an island, marking a point on its western coast with an X.
“You have lied to me already, and now you expect me to believe this-charlatanry?” Águia said coldly, once Jack had pushed the paper back to him across the table.
“Well, that’s up to you, Captain. Or I can give you the coordinates, and you can decide for yourself . . .”
“You know the island’s coordinates.”
“I do, at that.”
“Well?”
“Before you do, I want some assurance that I’ll be spared once we reach Atlantis. I want a cut of the spoils and release at the nearest settlement.”
“What of your brother?” Águia asked.
“Oh, him?” Jack said. “Not my brother. Not even my second cousin. Just some poor fool I picked up in Algiers. He’d been sitting on that map for years, never done a thing with it. I dazzled him with the promise of a little adventure and next thing you know, we’re hopping on your fine vessel. Do what you like with him. I was planning on cutting him loose once we’d reached the island, anyway. Just-wait till the right moment . . . Who knows, maybe while you’re waiting, that head wound of his will kill him and you won’t have to trouble yourself.” He offered the captain a sharp smile. After all, he thought bitterly, watching Águia’s eyes narrow, it was best to stick close to the truth.
“You know, there are ways to get the coordinates that don’t involve bargaining . . .”
“I think you’ll find I’m intractably stubborn,” Jack replied with a steely smile. “And, besides . . . What’s one man’s share when you consider all the riches of an ancient civilization? It’s a winning arrangement all around . . . You get your glory, and I get my cut.”
Águia looked at him for a moment longer, before nodding briefly to the burly sailor who’d escorted Jack from the brig. “Take this man to the helm, and see that he divulges the bearings.”
The sailor grunted an assent and yanked Jack out of his chair. He followed docilely, calling over his shoulder to Águia as he left, “Pleasure doing business with you, mate!”
After Jack was returned to the brig, he found that Captain Águia had finally thought better of leaving them unsupervised. A reedy, sharp-eyed guard had been posted, and so it was all Jack could do to flop down next to James on the sawdust and bind his fingers while he waited.
Eventually, the guard departed to eat dinner, and Jack turned to the geographer. “Well, Jim, there’s good news and there’s bad news,” he said with a crooked grin.
But James wasn’t smiling. He was looking at Jack with a look of detached disdain. “Don’t worry, Jack. They already broke the news to me.”
“Beg pardon?”
“There’s no reason to be coy about it. I suppose I should’ve expected as much.”
“As much as what, mate?” Jack asked, rather bemused.
He shot Jack a weary look that spoke clearly of how little James really thought of him. “Your life and a cut of the treasure if you gave up the bearings, and to hell with me. I can’t say I’m surprised. After all, you are just a pirate.”
James’ anger hit home, and Jack ignored the little voice that told him James wasn’t half wrong. “Look, mate, nobody’s getting thrown over here.”
“No? Because it sounds remarkably like that’s exactly what’s happening.”
“I did give bearings to Águia, but they weren’t the correct bearings, savvy?”
James paused, his mouth still open. “You expect me to believe this.”
“Aye.”
“Give me one reason.”
Jack shook his head. “Can’t be done, mate,” he said regretfully. “I can’t make you believe anything you haven’t got it in you to do.”
“If this is true, why didn’t you tell me what you planned to do?”
“Didn’t know exactly what I’d do till I’d done it, did I? You can plan all you like, but sometimes all it takes is a stroke of luck at the opportune moment.”
“So you’re telling me,” James said slowly, “that divine inspiration struck you.”
“In a manner of speaking.”
For a moment, James said nothing. And then he said, “And where did this divine voice tell you to direct the Captain?”
“Ah,” Jack said, with no little relief. “That’s where the good and bad news comes in, see. The good news is, we’ve set the good Captain on a course to what he believes is the ruins of Atlantis, and which will almost certainly lead to his demise. The bad news is, it could possibly lead to our demise, too.”
James gave him a wary look. “You have a very curious way of not betraying me, Jack,” he said, but Jack could swear there was a slight smile playing on his lips.
The plan was working beautifully. Unfortunately, that meant that Jack and James were currently in quite a lot of trouble. But it was trouble Jack had faith they’d manage to survive.
All around them, there was chaos. The Graciana was taking on water, the prow of another sunken ship piercing her hull. The waters around the Isla de Muerta were dangerous that way, which was exactly why Jack had directed their captors there, banking on the island’s uncanny ability to do away with the uninitiated.
“Come on!” Jack cried, pulling James along the deck. The geographer stumbled along after him, tripping over an abandoned bit of line. Jack glanced up briefly and noted that the burly sailor who’d assaulted James was tangled up in the other end of the line, suspended upside down halfway up the mast. “No time to lose, mate, got to get to our boat!”
This was all part of the plan, as Jack had conceived it during his various trips topside. He’d picked out the lifeboat and, in a bit of daring he was almost sorry no one had noticed, had managed to swipe the key to the brig only last night. So, while the Graciana’s crew was busy trying to save her from sinking into the murky depths around the Island de Muerta, Jack and James were making their escape.
The jollyboat was just where Jack had left it, and together they put it in the water, though by the time they’d lowered themselves into it, James’ energy was nearly spent. Jack didn’t complain that the bulk of the rowing went to him. He put his back into it, glad enough to be free of Captain Águia and his fetid brig.
Once they’d secured themselves in a pleasant little hidey-hole on the Isla de Muerta, James went to sleep. While he rested, Jack sat up awake and watched the goings on in the cave. The amount of treasure was impressive, heaps of it everywhere, even some spilled in the water. But despite all the glitter, there was a pervading sense of malice in the cavern that chilled Jack’s bones. Translucent night crabs wandered by, clicking their claws curiously, and the dark stones seemed to draw wheezing breaths with the tide. It made Jack wonder if maybe he should be thanking Barbossa for mutinying against him. Whatever the prize that this cavern held, he wasn’t sure it was worth the dread that permeated Jack more completely with every minute he stayed.
When James finally woke, he looked even worse than he had before resting, but he insisted that he was hale and hearty. He did want some answers, however, and it was the least Jack could do to oblige.
“The Isla de Muerta?” James echoed. “The island with the cursed treasure.”
“The very same.”
“Which means . . . that we are currently trespassing on the headquarters of the very men who betrayed you and left you for dead two years ago?”
Jack’s lips twitched into a bitter smile. “Precisely.”
“And there’s no way of telling when these mutineers will return?”
“None whatsoever.”
James let out a heavy sigh. “Excellent.”
Jack had to admit, he didn’t exactly find their situation ideal, either. But at least they were free agents again, and he favored their chances of avoiding Barbossa better than he did their chances of staying alive with Águia around. Even still, it galled him, to be so close to his prize, to know that if he only waited long enough, he’d see his beloved Pearl again, sailing into this very cavern. He would have endured a hundred lifetimes inside this dread cove, if he could only touch the Pearl again. And yet, he knew he had to move on. Even James knew it. There was no advantage to press in this situation. Facing Barbossa now would certainly mean death. Better instead to go on, and return another day when his luck was improved. And improve it would. It had to.
On to Chapter Five
Back to Chapter Three
Author: cassyl
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Jack Sparrow/James Norrington
Summary: Jack’s search for a fabled map leads him on an adventure that may mean more than he ever bargained for.
Warnings: This is AU like whoa. I also want to point out that, although many locations in this story are based on real places, they are all fictionalized versions of themselves. Furthermore, no copyright infringement is intended.
THE LOST CITY
“There is a tide in the affairs of men Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune; Omitted, all the voyage of their life Is bound in shallows and in miseries . . .”
-- Shakespeare, Julius Caesar
CHAPTER FOUR
Once the brothers Smith had been bound and the younger Smith had been suitably revived, they were brought to Captain Águia’s cabin. The Portuguese captain was sitting behind his desk. He gave the impression of being at once very rich and quite Spartan. His cabin was generously appointed but forbidding, his jacket finely embroidered but dark, his tanned face handsome but stony. James took all this in with a dazed, glassy-eyed gaze, but Jack felt nothing but foreboding.
“I will not waste my words,” he said, his sharp, dark eyes sweeping over the two of them. “I want your map.”
“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about, Captain,” Jack replied breezily. “But my brother here’s a dab hand with a pen, I’ve no doubt he could sketch you up any sort of map you might need.”
“I thought it was not necessary to say, but perhaps I was mistaken,” Águia said. “I want your map and I won’t hesitate to kill you and search your corpse for it if you don’t capitulate.”
Jack saw James open his mouth. “Best to capitulate, then,” Jack said before James could say anything.
“I’m glad we understand each other.” Águia shuffled some papers on his desk needlessly, just to impress their unimportance on them. His dislike for the captain had grown immensely in the past two minutes. “My men are searching your cabin as we speak.”
Jack experienced a sudden surge of relief that he’d taken to carrying the map around in his breast pocket. “Ah, it’s good that you’ve detained us here in that case. Wouldn’t want to get in their way. Tell me, how long have you known?” Jack asked, buying himself time to think.
“Since Casa Branca. One of my men heard you discussing it at the inn.”
“Quite the loyal crew you have, Captain. If it were me who’d overheard that conversation, I’d have waited until the opportune moment to make my play, and I can’t say that I’d have involved the entire crew. Greater share with fewer men. But who’s to say that isn’t the case here and now?” Jack grinned over his shoulder at the large guard who stood behind him. “Best to keep mum until the time comes to strike, eh?”
Águia gave a brief nod to the guard, who promptly grabbed Jack’s shoulder and wrenched it sharply. Jack managed to bite back the shout that wanted to rise from his lips, but a sweat broke out all over his body. He heard something metal rattle-James’ manacles, he realized. “Don’t think you can talk your way out of this business,” the captain said. “I don’t take well to dissemblers.”
“No dissembling here, mate,” Jack gasped.
“I’m glad we understand each other. Now, I’ll thank you to tell me everything you know about the map.”
A silence stretched out in the cabin, and Jack realized that James was in no mood to comply. He shot the geographer a pointed look and lifted his eyebrows. James nodded slowly in response. None of this escaped the Portuguese’s meticulous attention.
James took a deep breath and seemed to pull himself up to his full height before he began to speak. “I bought the map in Cádiz from an antiques dealer,” James said, meeting Águia’s narrowed eyes with an expression of bland truthfulness. “He couldn’t tell me anything about it, except that it came from a sage in Tripoli. It came in a box of old coins-supposedly from the Lost City-and it was inside a gold case. That’s all I know.”
“And where is the map now?”
“It’s in the cabin,” Jack cut in. “James, where did you put it away last?”
James frowned. “I didn’t . . .”
“Yes,” Jack replied pointedly. “You did. I gave it to you and asked you to put it away.”
“No . . .” James spoke slowly, but Jack saw that he’d finally caught on. “I thought you put it away.”
“No, there’s no way, it was definitely-”
“Enough,” snapped Águia.
“Apologies, mate,” Jack said, bowing his head remorsefully. “In any case, it’s in the cabin, and I’ve the utmost faith that your loyal men will find it soon enough.”
“You’re very willing to divulge this information,” the captain said, unimpressed.
“Well, after all,” James replied, “we’ve just had a taste of what you’ve got in store for us if we don’t. Given the choice, most people wouldn’t choose to repeat the experience.”
“I’m afraid you mistake me,” Captain Águia said. “You will take me to Atlantis, and the only choice you have in the matter is whether, once I am done with you, you prefer a quick death, or a slow one.”
Jack couldn’t help laughing. “Not much of an incentive, is it?”
It seemed that the effort of holding himself upright during their audience with Águia had told on James, for once their escort had left them securely situated in the brig, he let himself slump against the floor. Presently Jack sat down beside him and said, “Let me have a look at that.”
James leaned forward obediently, and Jack scooted closer to examine the damage. There was blood in James’ hair, and he made a choked noise whenever Jack’s fingers ranged too close to the actual wound. The stillness of his body told Jack that James was holding his breath. When Jack finally withdrew his fingers, wiping them on his breeches, James let out a shaky sigh and said, “I think I’ll take the quick death.”
“Nobody’s dying yet, mate,” Jack replied, leaning back against the wall and motioning for silence. He listened for a moment, making sure that the creak of the hull was the only sound before he went on. “While Águia’s busy searching our trunks, we’ve got work to do.”
“Work?”
“I’ve got the map safe and sound.” He tapped his chest. “But it won’t be long before Águia realizes that. So before he does, we’ve got to get rid of it.”
This time, James didn’t bother to repeat Jack’s words, just stared at him with a look of dull shock.
“Well, obviously, we can’t keep it, or else he’ll find it and he’ll deduce, just as we did, where exactly that island is. We’ve looked at the map enough to know what’s what. And if the physical map is gone, there’s no way our friend Águia can call our bluff.”
“And what, exactly, is our bluff, Jack?”
“I think the less you know, mate, the better.”
James considered this for some time, before finally holding out his hand and saying, “Give me the map.”
Jack hesitated only a moment before he withdrew the cloth from his pocket and handed it to James. The geographer unfolded the map and paused a moment, regretful, looking for all the world like a priest about to desecrate his altar. But then James started ripping the stitches out of the cloth, using his teeth where he had to. Once the fabric was blank, he ripped it in two and held it out to Jack, saying, “Find somewhere to hide those.”
While James rested, Jack scuttled around their cell, squeezing the two bits of cloth into crannies in the floorboards. He returned to find James still brushing little scraps of thread into the pile of sawdust in the corner of the cell.
“How’s that head wound?” Jack asked.
“Oh, middling fair,” James replied with a strained smile.
Jack wasn’t sure what they’d do, but he knew they’d escape. It was just a matter of making it to the next opportune moment. So he smiled, and patted James on the back and said, “Don’t you worry, Jim, m’lad. I’ve wriggled my way out of worser scrapes than this. After all, compared to that time with the one-legged whore in Cartagena, this is nothing.”
That was how Jack waited, keeping James awake by telling him increasingly outrageous stories. And all the time, while he fabricated wild lies about Spanish whores and one-eyed rumrunners, he was wracking his brain, trying to think of a way to get out of this mess alive.
Of course, it was true that Jack had gotten himself out of bigger trouble than the trouble he was in now. But usually such daring escapes involved unexpected good fortune, and it seemed that Jack’s luck had been running a bit low recently.
Águia’s men had broken his second finger when Jack decided it would be a good idea to say, “There’s no need to push, mate, give me the pen.”
Holding his throbbing left hand close to his chest, he took the quill from the Portuguese captain and sketched the outline of an island, marking a point on its western coast with an X.
“You have lied to me already, and now you expect me to believe this-charlatanry?” Águia said coldly, once Jack had pushed the paper back to him across the table.
“Well, that’s up to you, Captain. Or I can give you the coordinates, and you can decide for yourself . . .”
“You know the island’s coordinates.”
“I do, at that.”
“Well?”
“Before you do, I want some assurance that I’ll be spared once we reach Atlantis. I want a cut of the spoils and release at the nearest settlement.”
“What of your brother?” Águia asked.
“Oh, him?” Jack said. “Not my brother. Not even my second cousin. Just some poor fool I picked up in Algiers. He’d been sitting on that map for years, never done a thing with it. I dazzled him with the promise of a little adventure and next thing you know, we’re hopping on your fine vessel. Do what you like with him. I was planning on cutting him loose once we’d reached the island, anyway. Just-wait till the right moment . . . Who knows, maybe while you’re waiting, that head wound of his will kill him and you won’t have to trouble yourself.” He offered the captain a sharp smile. After all, he thought bitterly, watching Águia’s eyes narrow, it was best to stick close to the truth.
“You know, there are ways to get the coordinates that don’t involve bargaining . . .”
“I think you’ll find I’m intractably stubborn,” Jack replied with a steely smile. “And, besides . . . What’s one man’s share when you consider all the riches of an ancient civilization? It’s a winning arrangement all around . . . You get your glory, and I get my cut.”
Águia looked at him for a moment longer, before nodding briefly to the burly sailor who’d escorted Jack from the brig. “Take this man to the helm, and see that he divulges the bearings.”
The sailor grunted an assent and yanked Jack out of his chair. He followed docilely, calling over his shoulder to Águia as he left, “Pleasure doing business with you, mate!”
After Jack was returned to the brig, he found that Captain Águia had finally thought better of leaving them unsupervised. A reedy, sharp-eyed guard had been posted, and so it was all Jack could do to flop down next to James on the sawdust and bind his fingers while he waited.
Eventually, the guard departed to eat dinner, and Jack turned to the geographer. “Well, Jim, there’s good news and there’s bad news,” he said with a crooked grin.
But James wasn’t smiling. He was looking at Jack with a look of detached disdain. “Don’t worry, Jack. They already broke the news to me.”
“Beg pardon?”
“There’s no reason to be coy about it. I suppose I should’ve expected as much.”
“As much as what, mate?” Jack asked, rather bemused.
He shot Jack a weary look that spoke clearly of how little James really thought of him. “Your life and a cut of the treasure if you gave up the bearings, and to hell with me. I can’t say I’m surprised. After all, you are just a pirate.”
James’ anger hit home, and Jack ignored the little voice that told him James wasn’t half wrong. “Look, mate, nobody’s getting thrown over here.”
“No? Because it sounds remarkably like that’s exactly what’s happening.”
“I did give bearings to Águia, but they weren’t the correct bearings, savvy?”
James paused, his mouth still open. “You expect me to believe this.”
“Aye.”
“Give me one reason.”
Jack shook his head. “Can’t be done, mate,” he said regretfully. “I can’t make you believe anything you haven’t got it in you to do.”
“If this is true, why didn’t you tell me what you planned to do?”
“Didn’t know exactly what I’d do till I’d done it, did I? You can plan all you like, but sometimes all it takes is a stroke of luck at the opportune moment.”
“So you’re telling me,” James said slowly, “that divine inspiration struck you.”
“In a manner of speaking.”
For a moment, James said nothing. And then he said, “And where did this divine voice tell you to direct the Captain?”
“Ah,” Jack said, with no little relief. “That’s where the good and bad news comes in, see. The good news is, we’ve set the good Captain on a course to what he believes is the ruins of Atlantis, and which will almost certainly lead to his demise. The bad news is, it could possibly lead to our demise, too.”
James gave him a wary look. “You have a very curious way of not betraying me, Jack,” he said, but Jack could swear there was a slight smile playing on his lips.
The plan was working beautifully. Unfortunately, that meant that Jack and James were currently in quite a lot of trouble. But it was trouble Jack had faith they’d manage to survive.
All around them, there was chaos. The Graciana was taking on water, the prow of another sunken ship piercing her hull. The waters around the Isla de Muerta were dangerous that way, which was exactly why Jack had directed their captors there, banking on the island’s uncanny ability to do away with the uninitiated.
“Come on!” Jack cried, pulling James along the deck. The geographer stumbled along after him, tripping over an abandoned bit of line. Jack glanced up briefly and noted that the burly sailor who’d assaulted James was tangled up in the other end of the line, suspended upside down halfway up the mast. “No time to lose, mate, got to get to our boat!”
This was all part of the plan, as Jack had conceived it during his various trips topside. He’d picked out the lifeboat and, in a bit of daring he was almost sorry no one had noticed, had managed to swipe the key to the brig only last night. So, while the Graciana’s crew was busy trying to save her from sinking into the murky depths around the Island de Muerta, Jack and James were making their escape.
The jollyboat was just where Jack had left it, and together they put it in the water, though by the time they’d lowered themselves into it, James’ energy was nearly spent. Jack didn’t complain that the bulk of the rowing went to him. He put his back into it, glad enough to be free of Captain Águia and his fetid brig.
Once they’d secured themselves in a pleasant little hidey-hole on the Isla de Muerta, James went to sleep. While he rested, Jack sat up awake and watched the goings on in the cave. The amount of treasure was impressive, heaps of it everywhere, even some spilled in the water. But despite all the glitter, there was a pervading sense of malice in the cavern that chilled Jack’s bones. Translucent night crabs wandered by, clicking their claws curiously, and the dark stones seemed to draw wheezing breaths with the tide. It made Jack wonder if maybe he should be thanking Barbossa for mutinying against him. Whatever the prize that this cavern held, he wasn’t sure it was worth the dread that permeated Jack more completely with every minute he stayed.
When James finally woke, he looked even worse than he had before resting, but he insisted that he was hale and hearty. He did want some answers, however, and it was the least Jack could do to oblige.
“The Isla de Muerta?” James echoed. “The island with the cursed treasure.”
“The very same.”
“Which means . . . that we are currently trespassing on the headquarters of the very men who betrayed you and left you for dead two years ago?”
Jack’s lips twitched into a bitter smile. “Precisely.”
“And there’s no way of telling when these mutineers will return?”
“None whatsoever.”
James let out a heavy sigh. “Excellent.”
Jack had to admit, he didn’t exactly find their situation ideal, either. But at least they were free agents again, and he favored their chances of avoiding Barbossa better than he did their chances of staying alive with Águia around. Even still, it galled him, to be so close to his prize, to know that if he only waited long enough, he’d see his beloved Pearl again, sailing into this very cavern. He would have endured a hundred lifetimes inside this dread cove, if he could only touch the Pearl again. And yet, he knew he had to move on. Even James knew it. There was no advantage to press in this situation. Facing Barbossa now would certainly mean death. Better instead to go on, and return another day when his luck was improved. And improve it would. It had to.
On to Chapter Five
Back to Chapter Three