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Betwixt Hammer & Frizzen	By : GeorgieFain Category: Pirates of the Caribbean (All) > General Views: 2032 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own the Pirates of the Caribbean movie series, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

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Running Downwind

Day Two.

The ship was nearly to Hispaniola, that scrubby cattle-logged land where her mum's family had come from. Not but a day's sail from Turtle Island. Only, with her papa at the helm, they had moved slower than necessary and she knew why. Jack had asked the dog to go easy, allowing the long-boat to catch up fair easy.

She'd been setting the black sails all day, up and down the ratlines and out along booms, knife in her teeth and that blasted monkey right on her heels. Seemed every bleeding where she went, the ugly wee thing followed. Spying, likely. The sails of the mizzenmast, where she perched, had been adjusted at least ten bleeding times in the last half-day. Did the man not know his own mind? The winds were nay fierce, there was no call to be constantly resetting the sails. Mayhap, he just liked to know he was in command and could tell her and the crew to do whatever he liked, as now he was in undisputed command.

She had set to with the men at a barrel, eating the midday meal, and talked of what they were after---the treasure which both Uncle Jack and her papa had crowed for. She had put the doubt in these pirates' minds, the doubt of what Barbossa wanted. Did they really have a heading or were they just sailing hard for no damn good reason? What proof had Barbossa offered?

Now, she sat on a boom at the top mizzenmast sail; the edges of her short hair blew in the breeze as she kept her eye on the quarterdeck below. With her bare feet wrapped around the bit end of a rope, she was secure enough to not use her hands. Instead, she carved at a bit of wood with her tiny, sharp knife. It was shaping up to be a nice bauble, the mermaid she was chipping into the piece of curved, white banyan root.

She had been waiting for more than a fair watch, to see what the men would do.

After spending more than a fortnight talking up a rebellion against her papa, she had switched tactics and talked up a rebellion against Jack---at Jack's insistence. But, even as she had, the men still talked privately of throwing Barbossa off the ship. Seemed the crew as what had sailed with him under the curse---not as there was many of them left aboard---did bear the man a measure of mistrust for the ten years' worth of troubles they'd endured.

She had played on that mistrust, worrying at it like a dog with a gnawed bone.

Soon, it would come to a fight.

Beneath her, the world was naught but deck and the moving forms of the men and the endless horizon of sea. Her lovely, lovely sea. She had always loved the sea and, now, being back in these familiar waters---it was a homecoming, to see the changing of color and shade as schools of fish fled along before sharks and even dolphins. To feel the heave and pull and thrust of the waves and the wind, the creak of sails and rope and wood. Ships and the sea had been her life since signing on with Jack, when she was only a wee thing. She could only barely remember anything of her mum from time on land and of her tante, Tia Dalma, she remembered a great deal. But, life on land had never meant very much...not to her. Not with all those times of hearing the tales from sea-going sailors and pirates who did come up the Pantano and to Kingston. Not with hearing all the stories that Jack had given her to hear, late in the evenings before a warm fire and a hot meal at the table her tante had kept on those occasions when Jack did make port and visited.

She would live her life at sea. She would die at sea and be relinquished to the depths, at the last. And that was a comfort, to a soul as what couldn't remember what a storm on land did feel like. Sailing aboard the Black Pearl was a dream come true, even as she would never tell any of how glad it did make her heart. She was living with the ship of those wondrous childhood stories. More to the truth, it was a rare treat to sail with Jack again. And she had found something unusual and unwanted in sailing under Hector Barbossa. She did enjoy working the deck, when he was captain. It was a surprise, unpleasant and disturbing. She enjoyed his company when they sat down to dine together in the cabin, talking of their adventures and of books. She tried very hard to not like him, but did discover it hard to find the same disgust and disdain as she had felt upon first boarding the Pearl.

He was everything Jack had told her of, both good and bad! Everything and more!

Still, he was going to get what he deserved. She would make sure of that.

Below, the world shifted as the winds changed a bit and took up the sails in a new way. Men scrambled to adjust and she slid her carving away into the front of her shirt and turned to follow the example with knife in her teeth, crawling up the ratlines to the main topmast, to bring the sail in to the lee of the new wind. She was almost finished with the topsails on the mizzenmast when Barbossa shouted out his command to the men.

"We've a broad reach, gents! Tack those sails to the lee!"

Finished with the topsail, she slithered down the ratlines again to the mizzenmast's gaff and, rolling herself like a snake, moved down to the main mizzensails, taking up the rope to swing its boom into the oncoming breeze. At last and done, Henriette crawled down to the bottom shroud and sat at their top, where the shroud became ratlines. On the boom's edge, she perched and drew out her carving once more from where she'd dropped it down the front of her tucked-in shirt. With knife in hand once again, she started worked on the tail portion of her mermaid.

But, she didn't get to work on it very long.

Barbossa had been feeding his creepy little monkey at the quarterdeck and she'd been trying to ignore him, even though he was only a few meters below and before her. Then, as she looked up, she saw the men make their move in the bright sunlight. Isaiah Ragetti and his never-absent matelot, Pintel, started for the quarterdeck's steps, followed by Mullroy and Murtaugh. It was what she'd been watching for. The four of them were the ones she'd worked the hardest on, talking mutiny against Barbossa. Two of them---Ragetti and Pintel---had sailed under the curse with Barbossa and had learned to enjoy Jack Sparrow as their captain.

The other two---Mullroy and Murtaugh---were new to the pirate life, having come aboard during the time of the battle with the East India Trading Company, from what they had said. Mullroy, in particular, had talked of it to her as she was bandaging a cut on his arm from a turn at repairing broken gunwales. Quite friendly, he was, and talked of being stationed among fish people on the Flying Dutchman under Admiral Norrington. The two of them, having formed a liking for Jack in previous encounters, had decided to go on account and join Jack's crew. They hadn't wanted to put Jack ashore in Tortuga and it was only at her insistence that things would straighten out with a bit of real pirating that the two ex-Navy marines had agreed to follow Barbossa for a bit.

She watched as the four men climbed the stairs to the quarterdeck. Ragetti had his knife and a piece of wood, nervously carving a new eye to replace the black leather patch he was wearing these days.

Henriette listened, only now and then flicking her eyes up from her mermaid to watch the proceedings. The four asked to see some proof of the treasure they were after, as it would relieve their burden of guilt over leaving Jack Sparrow behind on Tortuga. Hector Barbossa was in a fine mood, smiling and pleased---the devil hisself!---feeding peanuts to the ugly wee creature he petted on. The Chinese charts were drawn out and laid flat on the navigator's bench.

"Gents...the Fountain of Youth!" He sounded so thrilled, as if he had come up with the plan himself. But, then, as she watched, Barbossa raised his head and she caught a glimpse of his sunlit face under the brim of his massive hat as he stared out over the ship with consternation. His voice was low, venomous. "Jack Sparrow."

She could see the charts, now, and realized...the concentric circles of them were gone.

Henriette barely managed to bite her lower lip in time to stop the whoop of glee that threatened to burble up from her chest at the truth. Her papa---damn him---had been double-crossed. Jack's work, no doubt, and it seemed that Barbossa thought so, too. And who else could it be, aye? Only Jack had gotten any access to the charts, where they usually stayed in the cabin or on her papa's body, in the inner pocket of his long-coat.

As she watched, the men began to argue among themselves, stopping everything they did to come at the stern. They all stopped below the quarterdeck, querulously demanding to know what they would do, now---what did Barbossa intend to do?

Barbossa shouted out at them, rolling the charts up. "Shut yer holes, ye witless arsebites! Master Cotton! Take th' helm---back to work, all o' ye!" Then, he took the charts and pushed through the crowd of men, down the quarterdeck stairs, and around to the cabin door. The monkey chattered and disappeared into the aft holds.

When the doors slammed shut, only then did she grin.

Quickly, Henriette slid the rest of the way down from the shrouds and ratlines and stood among the men. Planting her bare feet, she called them to order, roaring. "Back to work! Remember yourselves, men! Remember our agreement! I'll be makin' our case to th' captain, now!"

They all fell out, going back to the job of putting the ship on angle to the wind, pushing south to Hispaniola. They muttered among themselves, but Pintel screamed a few times, backing up her orders. Things went back to the proper way of things. Only when she knew that she could leave the deck did she escape, hurrying along to the prow and down the steps there, to the hold.

Pushing through the dimness there, she made a way to her surgery. Reaching it, she lit a candle and stripped out of the sail-cloth breeches she wore and the worn linen sark. With a rag dragged up from the bucket of hyssop water she kept under her bench, she washed herself free of sweat quickly and removed the worn scarf on her head. Moving efficiently, as if preparing to remove a man's ruined leg or arm, she dressed in her fine gentleman's clothes and slid her feet into freshly polished boots.

Madame Sullivan slinkered through the sail-cloth, miaowing at her, as she began tying a clean, red scarf onto her short brown waves. She nodded at the scraggly black cat, whispering. "Hello, love...catch any little ratsies for your supper?"

The cat hopped up on the sail-cloth pallet and began washing herself fastidiously, as if born to reign.

Grinning to herself at the idea of a fuzzy wicked cat ruling the roost, Henriette picked up her hat from where it lay on her sea chest. Dusting at it with her fingertips, she straightened her shoulders and took a deep breath and then slipped it on her head, snugly pulling it into place over the bright, clean scarf. She scooped up her pistol and her knife from the pallet and tucked them into the blue scarf at her hip. Then, she dug into the physicking chest that sat against the curved hull. Inside was the tiny green bottle she needed. Humming to herself, Henriette uncorked it and poured a bit of the soft, tan powder into the palm of her left hand. In the crook of her elbow, she held a clear bottle that held just a cup or two of rum.

It would stand as an offering to her papa, in 'parlay'.

Finished, she leaned down to kiss the curious cat on the scarred nose with a whisper. "We'll see what we do see, me sweetlin'. No one ever did succeed in this world by relying on the wits of others. A-sides...Uncle Jack's a very smart man. He should thank me for what I'm about, here. I'm saving him the trouble of it."

Jack had told her that Barbossa was actually rather soft on the idea of being her father in more than simply blood. It did seem as though Hector Barbossa pushed her harder than the other pirates, but he also invited her to share supper at his table in privacy for long chats. He would never declare himself her papa unless he had some plan or scheme at mind and she could care less for all of that. But, he was her father and while it had never meant very much before, it most certainly did now. She was sailing on a ship that he captained. She was following his orders. She had fallen into admiring his sense of command and his wit. Point of fact, as Jack might say, she had learned to like Hector Barbossa despite her best intentions. And that was as sore a bruise as any she'd ever taken, at work or play.

Ondeck, she swaggered to the cabin.

In passing Ragetti, she gave the master gunner a lopsided grin.

He nodded in return, lifting the side of his mouth in a tiny smile of his own.

She didn't bother to knock at the door, but instead entered as if she had the bold right to do as she did please. Her papa sat at the table, studying a chart by the light of the open windows. His gingery beard was frizzled from where he had been working at it with his fingernails. He held a pair of scissor-like dividers, lost in the work of marking off distance. It wasn't the Chinese charts, but something much more English or perhaps Dutch. Henriette moved across the cabin's deck at a fast clip, sure of herself in this moment. As she reached the sideboard, under the large mullioned windows to the ship's port side, Barbossa growled at her without looking up.

"Get out, lass---ye've work to be doin' an' I've no time for ye, just th' now."

With her back to him, she tipped the powder into one of the cups that sat on the sideboard. Holding that cup together with another metal cup and her nearly empty bottle of rum, she swung around to face the table. "Those men are sorely disappointed in this whole tragedy of yours. They do intend to mutiny, Captain."

Her large, ferocious papa removed his hat and laid it to the side, his long graying hair and the tail-end of his faded green scarf swaying back and forth at his shoulders as he turned to look up at her approach. He did snarl, his scarred face going red with irritation. "An' I expect ye'll be th' leader, aye? Ye come in here, bearin' gifts, an' wearin' yer best---are ye th' one to take me place, missy? If so---" Barbossa made to rise, his green-blue eyes narrowed to slits. "Ye've a fight on yer hands an' well ye know it."

She waved the cups at him with a shake of her head. "Nay, don't bother with it---I've got what we need."

Putting the bottle and the cups on the table before her, she slouched down into Jack's chair and began pouring out. There was, point of fact, enough for two and a half cups. Folding one leg over the other as she made herself comfortable, she slid the dosed cup to her papa's elbow, right at the edge of the charts which he had pinned down with a pistol and his knife. So, they were both armed in a matter of speaking, it did seem. She removed her hat and laid it to the side on the table, not so far from the bottle, which showed the final half-cup---naught but two swallows---as liquid gold within the wobbly-translucent glass.

As she lifted her own cup for a sip, she answered with her lips to the rim. "I don't have the men's loyalty. They won't follow me. But, you...they will. If you have the right leverage."

After a drink, she lowered the cup and smiled at him---he was watching her with a suspicious scowl. Cocking her head to the side, Henriette reached into her waistcoat pocket and pulled out the cigarillo and her tiny ornate metal box of splintered sulphurs. She struck one against the table's edge and brought it to the ragged end of the rolled tobacco, sending a plume of blue-white smoke up over the table between them as she continued. "Name me first mate...papa."

She had decided that only a very black-hearted act of piracy would be the best way to rid herself of the fearsome, tiny bits of warmth she felt at the idea of being on the same ship as her papa. If Barbossa didn't like her and didn't treat her any differently than any other pirate, she could go back to ignoring the niggling muzzy feeling she felt every time he did laugh or grin or call her 'missy'. As if he had the sire's right to lay claim to her affections.

It would teach him a very valuable lesson, one that he must never be allowed to forget.

Barbossa's pale eyes flared wide for but a moment and then were narrowed down, like an angry cat's. He growled in his throat, spitting the words. "Ye'll nay win me wi' cheap tricks, playin' to me soft side---I'vena got any softness to me. Nor had yer mum or ye'd nay have been cast aside."

It struck low and, surprisingly, did hurt. But, she steeled herself, refusing to let the insult cut. Internally, she thought from the fighter's position. If the man was going for the gut so soon, then he was worried and wanted to end the battle quick. Henriette shrugged, sipping again at her cup. She stared into its shallows, swishing it around nonchalantly. "I've a plan, sir. One that can get us out of the mess your careless nature has put this ship in."

"Careless!" Her papa thumped his fist on the charts. He was livid. "Ye wee---"

She waved her cigarillo at him, sending fresh smoke rivulets out as she leaned back in the chair with a creak. As Barbossa sputtered---something she hadn't ever seen before---she interrupted. "Sir, a thought. If you hadn't been bedding Jack Sparrow, he couldn't have gotten the guts of that chart out from under your hands. He stole me bleeding key and he has your charts---I'd say we've both been swindled. Aye?"

Her papa, graying and scarred and weathered, was florid with anger---but now he stopped and shifted his angular face to look at her from one side, his gaze sharp and searching. "What blasted key be that, missy?"

Henriette smiled, lifting one side of her long mouth in a curling smirk, holding the cigarillo close to her cheek. "A key as what will open any lock in the world. Me tante did give it to me before I left home again, this three years ago. Good ol' Jack's been so kind as to lift it off me as I slept."

He eyed her speculatively, his face showing nothing. Then, he spoke softly, his voice a threat. "An' ye be tellin' me this why?"

The sky beyond the windows was hazy and there was a strange feel in the air; she knew the smell of a storm coming. It had been brewing since just before the men had approached the quarterdeck. The winds had changed, shifted. Things were going to be bad, tonight. She tried to imagine Jack in naught but a long-boat and found herself thinking she ought to make an offering to Calypso's leniency---for Jack, if for no one else.

She kept it plain. "I think we'll need to be going after Jack and do it afore the storm hits."

Barbossa shook his head, making his tiger's tooth earring jingle. "I think yer mad." Then, he leaned over the table, demanding. "Why? Why should we go after him? What be yer game?"

Making a great show of capitulating, she dropped her eyes as if giving in on a point of contention. Playing the wee lass, Henriette lowered her voice to match. "I'll not cast eyes at him again, papa, if that's what on your mind. But, you need those charts. I can talk the men up, get them to agree. You need someone as who can make the crew strong to your call---I can say you're the better captain, and say as how you were swindled, which is no one's fault, when you think on how it was Jack who did the swindling. A pirate's always a pirate, aye? But, we do need him aboard. Once he's back, you can have me key---but, only if you do name me first mate of the Black Pearl."

Silence fell in the cabin; beyond it, she could hear the men singing a chanty as they worked. She drained her cup without looking up and then refilled it, emptying the bottle.

When she glanced up from under her lashes, she found her papa watching carefully. He looked from her to the door and then to the cups, as if trying to figure out what was really happening betwixt them. Henriette began to get nervous, her skin prickling with sweat. She wiped her sweaty hand down over the side of her breeches, swiping at the grains of powder in the creases of her palm. Her hand was tingling---not a good sign, with the powder. Then, she swallowed some of the rum in her cup and fiddled with the cigarillo she held, keeping her eyes down.

Barbossa played with the dividers he held and his tone was slow, careful. "D'ye think I need such help from ye, missy? D'ye not think as how I've been captainin' since afore ye were born? I was th' captain o' th' first privateerin' ship yer mum did sign Articles on. An' her naught but yer own age, aye? If I want that bloody key, I'll have it an' Jack Sparrow, too, wi'out yer help."

She finally raised her head and studied the cigarillo she held between her fingers, blowing at its tip to make the ember flare up as she answered him, coolly. "Oh, aye...you were the captain of the Victorious and a good captain, from what all I've heard and I've heard a great deal of it. But, I�ll not be the first to see that your luck only holds up as long as Jack sails with you. On your own, papa...well, things do go a bit differently. To me way of thinking, it seems as if you need Jack for your luck and then need me for the good graces of that heathen goddess which did take your child to foster. You need us both, I wager."

Her papa tugged at his reddish beard, voice lowering even more to a whispery growl. "T'was ye who did start th' mutiny, missy. Ye didna think I would know? What be yer real game, aye? Why d'ye come, now, makin' noise as to how we ought to be goin' after Jack?"

With a heavy sigh, she slumped and closed her eyes, deliberating a look of despair. She pushed her voice down to a choked murmur. "It wasn't Jack I was trying to be rid of...do you see? I'll admit it, what we both know. I was a-envying of how he does care so for you. Sir...papa...you must understand...I cannot see why he cares for you. It was you I was wanting to cast off, but then you began twisting it, making the men lean to your way of thinking. I gave in, seeing nothing else for it. I meant to wait until we reached land again and then ask you for my contract, but I have dreamed horrid things the last two nights---omens and the like. Jack Sparrow is meant to be aboard this ship---she's his soul-ransom. We must go after Jack. Get him aboard---and keep me key, if you like---I'll do whatever you wish, to keep the men in line, if you make me first mate under you. The crew will need to see me in the chain of command."

Barbossa grunted, noncommittally.

She opened her eyes and lifted her cup to drain it, her fingertips running along the ridged horn edge. Her cigarillo had burned out. She checked it, to make sure, and then tucked it away into her waistcoat pocket once more. It would last her for a day, if she was careful.

"Get out o' here. Let me think on it." Her papa looked intrigued but weary.

As she rose from the chair, making it creak ominously, she pointed to his untouched cup. "If you're not going to drink it, papa, mayhaps I can have it back for meself?"

The weathered pirate lord rolled his eyes at her and lifted the cup in his leather-wrapped hand, draining it all in a gulp, and then nodded at the door. "Make yerself scarce, miss, afore I have ye down to th' bilges."

Grabbing her hat from the table's edge, she moved quickly, going. Out the door and down along the rail of the starboard side, she walked, running her callused fingertips over the newly repaired gunwales. She skirted the deck cannons. There, as she finally reached the bow, she clapped her hat back on and stood with the wind to her back. She listened to the ship, enjoying the creaking pop of wood and the pop-billow of the sails. She watched as several of the new swabbies worked on hands and knees, scrubbing the deck with brushes and soap. She even turned to consider Cotton at the helm. She looked up to watch Marty in the crow's nest. It was the world as she knew it...as she understood. Pintel and Ragetti were close by the main mast, recoiling rope that was not being used. As she glanced at them, Ragetti looked up with his one good eye and met her gaze with a curious smile. As if he could imagine what she was thinking.

She gave him a cocky smile in return and then shifted, to find the horizon once more.

They would reach Hispaniola tomorrow. Unless something changed.

Something was already changing, as she waited. As expected.

She turned her gaze up and studied the sky and the clouds that were slow to move over the sun. The storm was still distant enough, out to open waters. But, tonight, there would be a smatter of rain. Tomorrow, there might be a hurricane. With her throat tightening a bit, she whispered to the tattooed and stained face she held within her heart. It mattered not that her tante was a heathen goddess. She seemed to have always known, deep inside. "Tante...if you can hear me, now, I ask for your blessings. Hold this ship in your hands safely. Protect and guide Jack Sparrow as one who has truly loved you and all that you represent. Lead me to victory."

Finished, she straightened again and turned to go back to the cabin. She didn't bother to look left or right at the men; she knew they were watching. They were waiting to see which way to jump, on the threat of mutiny. She opened the cabin door, again without bothering to knock. This time, she knew what she would find---there would be no protest at her entrance. And there wasn't.

Seeing everything as she expected, Henriette gave a dark smile and closed the door behind herself. She went around the table's edge, carefully watching Barbossa's unconscious form. He was truly asleep. He even snored a bit and she snickered at the sound of that. Stopping in front of him, she contemplated the unconscious form of her papa. He was nearly sliding out of his chair. In the light from the windows, Hector Barbossa looked so much older than she had imagined he could. She chewed on her thumbnail, watching him for a moment.

At last, she shook herself free of the deep and worrisome thoughts, giving a low chuckle. "Well, uncle did say as how it was high time I did stop working over me books and gave some study to me heart instead. Aye, papa? Pirate is as pirate does."

Then, she went to work, singing softly to herself the song that Mrs Turner had taught the crew. "We're beggars and blighters and ne'er do well cads, drink up, me hearties, yo ho---aye, but we're loved by our mums and our dads, drink up, me hearties, yo ho---yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me---yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me---"
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Betwixt Hammer & Frizzen