Legends of the Treasure Child

Jack was asleep with his little bundle next to him. The cub was feeding from his nipple again, tugging gently and persistently at it. Little John was a week old, and already he'd grown much. He resembled more that of a six month old baby than a newborn, and he was in dire need of clothing. Everybody had seen the change, especially Jack, who continuously pushed away the warning signs in the back of his head which told him that this was indeed not a normal child. He simply couldn’t cope with it, for the memory of the demon haunted him day and night, always waiting for him, showing himself just at the corner of Jack’s eye.
Jack had troubled dreams. The child sensed it, felt the quickened heartbeats, and intercepted the dream images now and then. Jack was dreaming of the Thyrion. Bad dreams, again.
In his dream, Jack was looking for something. Wherever he turned, he faced William and William’s question about how come Jack stayed untouched onboard the Dutchman.

“Elisabeth”, William would say in Jack’s head, for although he saw Will standing in front of him in his dream, Will did not open his mouth. The envy, the jealousy was glowing on Will’s face, his fists clenched and his face stern and condemning. “Elisabeth.” Jack had no answer for him, none other than it must be the child, yet it didn’t seem logical. And he knew what Will meant. The look in his eye spoke the truth. Jack was not welcome. It should have been Elisabeth and not him. For every time Jack lingered, the imaginative Will began to dissolve, and the demon took his place. Jack would turn just fast enough not to come face to face with him, and began to look for his baby all the while running from the demon, just to stumble upon Will again. And so the dream continued in a loop. Almost like it was telling him something.
He paused to look at himself. Speckled, slender feathers were growing out of his arms, on his fingers and hands. They even grew out of his fingertips, and very soon his arms formed into wings.

*I’ll pluck every last feather from your body and eat you, wing by wing, little Sparrow.*

The demon’s voice in his head again. Jack found himself standing on the ledge of the cliff, looking down at the Fountain of Youth. He had the wings. No arms but wings instead. Behind him was the demon. He felt relieved because of the wings, he could so easily escape, just leap off and fly away. But from the cave behind the demon came a familiar wailing. Little John. Jack knew he couldn’t abandon him. He turned dejectedly, dreading the very moment, forcing his legs to obey. The demon was standing between him and the boy and he simply had to go to him. He passed the demon, fell to his knees while peering into the darkness looking for his baby while he felt the first stings of pain as the demon ripped off the feathers from his left arm. Jack watched as his arm became visible again where the feathers had once been, feeling sick from pain as he saw the demon bite of his fingers, one by one, and chewing them all down. Jack turned his head to a noise coming from the cave. Out from the darkness of the cave came a hideous, childlike humanoid creature crawling on hands and knees, dribbling with its mouth open, grinning from ear to ear, showing off all the small sharp teeth. Its face was distorted with bug-like greedy yellow eyes bulging out of the sockets. It had a collar around its neck, with a chain attached to it, and up behind the child came none other than Captain Teague, Jack’s own father, grinning from ear to ear.

“Gold, Jackie boy, gold!” he laughed.

“Aye, the Pearl, the gold and the Treasure Child!” Jack replied, wanting to grin also, but the pain was starting to get to him for the demon was still eating of his left arm, almost up to his shoulder now. It all of the sudden grabbed him by the neck, dragging him past the hideous creature and Jack’s father, and Jack just avoided getting his toes bitten off as he passed the child before he was dragged off into darkness. Having just one arm made things awkward, and before Jack had managed to get his head around how to have only one arm, the demon was all over him, tearing the clothes off Jack’s body. Jack looked up to see Will leaning against a large rock, his face unreadable, sitting there as if nothing happened while the demon pushed himself inside Jack’s entrance. All the way right down to the hilt, until Jack felt it come up in his throat, choking on it.

“Why is it then, that YOU can linger on my ship while Elisabeth can’t?”

Jack wanted to tell him that he’d figured out the answer, but the demon’s cock which was pumping in and out of him, was blocking his throat, preventing Jack from speaking. All he managed to do was to draw his breath every time the demon pulled out. Then he felt a sharp sting in his right hand nipple, and woke.
John was tossing and turning, and his little mouth had let go of the nipple which was red and swollen and empty of milk. The child rubbed his face against the soft fabric of the make-shift bed Jack had made for them both. Jack brought a finger to his mouth, his eyebrows rising in disbelief at what he felt with his index fingertip. John was feverish and complained in his sleep. He was teething, with half a front tooth already emerging from his lower jaw.