Saints and Sinners

Usual disclaimers –
pah!

Thank you for your
reviews and comments – you know you lovestyle='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'> cliffhangers really… ;)style="mso-spacerun: yes"> Mind you, that’s not what I say to Starlight
8/Boshomengro when she style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'>leaves it on a cliffie!style="mso-spacerun: yes"> With thanks to Kat for her suggestions.

…style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'>

Chapter Eight

Ethan Penhallick
frowned as the Serpentstyle='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'> approached Tortuga harbour.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> He knew something was wrong but could not
quite put his finger on what. He
glanced at Jargo Teague who was also frowning.

“I dunno, Sir,” his
right hand man shrugged, not needing to hear the question.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “There ain’t no ships about fer a start, an’
haven’t been since yesterday.”

“The chain hasn’t
been drawn up,” Penhallick mused, knowing that this soon past dawn, the harbour
chain should still be in place.

“Mister
Penhallick!” the watchman called from the topmast yard.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “Th’mansion’s gone!”

“style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>What?” Penhallick exploded. “What
the fuck do you mean, gone?”

“It’s been burned
to th’ground, Sir.”

style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'>…

style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'> 

“Bloody hell,” Jack
Sparrow swore as a keen eared crewman relayed to him the exchange on the ship
ahead of the Black Pearlstyle='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'>.
“Burned to th’ground?”

“Aye, Cap’n, that’s
what he said.”

“What’s happened,
d’you reckon?” Joshamee Gibbs enquired.

“I don’t know,”
Jack replied absently, his mind racing with thoughts and ideas.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “My informant was keen for Penhallick ter be
involved in this. I wonder…”

“If he was fed the
information by whoever attacked, in order that Ethan be out of town when they
did?”

“Precisely that,
Mister Gibbs,” Jack nodded. “But best
we keep that idea to
ourselves, eh? Don’t want Penhallick
ter be havin’ th’wrong idea.”

“No,” the portly quartermaster agreed heartily.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “That is the last thing we need.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> I hope young Celia is all right,” he
frowned.

“Celia? Bloody
hell!” Jack swore. He had almost
forgotten about the young woman in the excitement of the past week or so.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> Jack idly wondered why he found the former
novice so interesting, but turned his attention away from her when he saw Ethan
Penhallick hailing him from the Serpent.

“Jack! It looks as
though the town’s been attacked,” the pirate king called.style="mso-spacerun: yes">

“So I gather,” Jack replied, making for the bow in order for
easier conversation. “Who do you reckon
could have done it?”

“Take your pick,” Penhallick snorted.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “Could have been Rackham, Smythe, LaFitte –
anyone.”

“What are you goin’ ter do?”

“See what’s what before I decide. The thing is, Jack, there might be trouble.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> Would you and your crew be willing to come
ashore and help me quell any trouble?”

Jack stroked his beard braids thoughtfully, eyeing up his friend
and ally. “It’ll cost you,” he called,
eventually. “I’m not riskin’ my men for
your trouble, Ethan.”

“I’ll see you right,” Penhallick sighed, shaking his head
and hoping that he would have enough money left to make good his debt.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> If not… Penhallick shuddered and pushed the
thought from his mind.

style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'>…

style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'> 

“Whoever it was,
certainly did a good job,” John Orchard observed as a group of style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>Black Pearl men stalked the streets, weapons raised, on the look-out for
trouble. But so far, none had been
forthcoming.

“Aye, didn’t they
just,” Joshamee Gibbs agreed. “I dread
to think how many ships they destroyed in the harbour.”style="mso-spacerun: yes"> He and the crew could not believe the amount
of flotsam in the port, and the two ships had had to carefully inch their way
in for fear of the wrecks of other ships tearing through their hulls.

“Jack!style="mso-spacerun: yes"> Jack Sparrow!” The men whirled round at the sound of a woman’s voice and gasped
in surprise when Aggie flew along the street towards them.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “Where is he?”

“Th’Cap’n’s comin’
up behind,” Jacob Sumner informed her.
“Why d’ya want him?” He looked
askance as the whore fled past him and down the hill to the docks.

“Blimey!style="mso-spacerun: yes"> She needs it bad,” Matthias Swain quipped,
nudging the man next to him, who grinned in return.

Jack looked up,
arching an eyebrow as he saw Aggie running hell for leather towards him,
catching her when she realised she was going too fast to halt and spun her
around to face him. “Where’s th’fire?”
he drawled, an amused gleam in his eyes.

“They’ve got her!”
Aggie gasped, struggling to regain her breath.
“Ya’ve got ter help her!”

“Who, and who?”
Jack grinned, still tickled by the whore’s theatrics.

“Celia,” she
panted. “Davy Stockton…”

“Bugger!” Jack
swore, the smile wiped from his face.
“When?”

“Th’day yer
sailed. Ya’ve got ter go an’ find her,”
Aggie demanded.

“If Stockton’s got
her, then it’s farstyle='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'> too late ter save her,” Jack sighed.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “I don’t even know where he is, anyway.”

“Yer know he sails
from Port-au-Prince – even Istyle='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'> know he sails from Port-au-Prince!” she shouted,
shoving Jack hard in the chest. “Yer
don’t care, do ya? Yer wanted ter be
th’first ter fuck her an’ now that ya won’t get that style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>honour, yer not interested! I thought
you were different, Sparrow – I thought yer had integrity.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> Well, I was wrong!”

“Whoa!” Jack
protested, holding up his hands in surrender.
“Stockton’s had her fer over a week.
I doubt very much that she’s still alive,” he said gently, placing his
hands on the woman’s shoulders. “I’m
sorry, Aggie, I really am. But there’s
nothin’ I can do fer Celia.”

“I wouldn’t be too
sure about that,” came Penhallick’s voice from behind them both.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “It seems, according to my maid, Margaret,
that Syn betrayed me. She threw in her
lot with Stockton an’ showed him where I stored some of my wealth,” he
sighed. “Bloody bitch!style="mso-spacerun: yes"> But at least she didn’t know where I keep style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>most of it! Anyway, it also seems
that she told Stockton that Celia’s a virgin.
He’ll sell her to the higest possible bidder, even if it means hanging
on to her for a while.”

“How does this
Margaret know all this?” Jack wondered pensively. “Why wasn’t she taken?”

“She went back for
Celia – Syn had made the girl stay back to help her pack her bloody
dresses! Can you believe the
woman? Margaret managed to hide in a
secret passageway and she overheard it all.”

“See!” Aggie
pushed. “There’s a chance…”

“Doesn’t mean I
have ter take it,” Jack defended.

“Then yer
th’biggest bastard of th’lot!” Aggie spat, pushing past both men and storming
back up the hill. “An’ I’ll make sure
all th’girls know what a fuckin’ bastard yer are!” she yelled over her
shoulder. “Yer’ll never get another
shag in this town again, Sparrow!”

“Cap’n!” Joshamee
Gibbs panted as he trotted towards them, avoiding going anywhere near the
screaming whore. “Celia’s been
taken! I’ve just been talking to Sarah,
Mister Penhalligan’s cook.”

“Oh God, not you as
well…” Jack groaned, rolling his eyes and throwing his hands in the air.

“It seems you’re
outnumbered, Jack,” Ethan remarked.
“Thanks for your help. It looks
as though there’s no-one left to cause any trouble.”

“My recompense?”
Jack enquired, regarding his companion expectantly.

“It may be a few
days or even weeks before I can pay you,” Penhallick shrugged apologetically.

“Fair enough,” Jack
nodded evenly, even though both men knew that he would not be forgettin the
debt. “Mister Gibbs, round up th’men
an’ we’ll be on our way.”

“But they haven’t
had any leave,” the quartermaster protested.
“There’ll be trouble - and what about Celia…?”

“I doubt there are
many girls left in town, there’s nowhere ter get supplies nor th’sails mended –
we move on. There’s nothin’ I can do
for th’girl,” Jack snapped, his patience at an end.

“Aye, Cap’n,” Gibbs
muttered before turning on his heel and heading back towards the centre of the
wrecked town.

style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'>…

style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'> 

Jack sat in his
cabin, nursing a mug of rum but not drinking it. By the time his quartermaster had managed to round up the crew,
it was too dark to risk sailing out of Tortuga harbour with the wrecks of the
other ships lying on the sea-bed. His
crew had glared sullenly at him and Gibbs had not spoken a word to him once
they returned to the ship, and Jack knew it was more than just the cancelled
leave that irked the portly man. He
guessed that Gibbs had met up with Aggie and that the whore had told his
quartermaster about the exchange between them.
Jack sighed deeply, bringing the mug to his lips before slamming it down
on the oak table without drinking from it.
“Damn!” he swore out loud, trying not to think about Celia and what she
might be going through. “It’s folly ter
go after her,” he muttered. “Far too
late…”

style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'>…

“Wake up, bitch!”

Celia’s eyes
snapped open at the sound of the harsh voice and she squinted in the bright
sunlight as the sailcloth that covered the cage she was in on the deck of the style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>Sea’s Cutlass, was thrown back.

“D’ya want
somethin’ ter eat?” the voice taunted her.
“Drink?”

“Drink, please,”
Celia gasped, her throat sore through lack of liquid.

“Give us a suck of
yer teat, an’ yer can have a drink,” the voice laughed, and a hand shot through
the bars of the cage and grasped her breast.

“Get off,” she
shrieked, pushing the hand away. “Leave
me alone.” For a week now, Celia had
been shut naked, in a cage on the deck, her only protection being the sail,
which was thrown over the cage to stop her gettin tanned - apparently, she was
worth far more to her captor if she was pale skinned. And the crew had had their fun with her.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> Grabbing whatever part of her body they
could reach, and unlacing their breeches and doing disgusting things through
the bars which left her sick with revulsion and fear.

“Give her
th’drink!” Stockton bellowed as he emerged from his cabin.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “She’s no use ter me if she dies, yer
fuckin’ idiot!”

Celia grabbed the
beaker of watery ale before the crewman could do anything and gulped it down,
not stopping until every last drop was finished. “C-can I have s-some more, p-please?” she asked meekly, relief
flooding over her as Stockton nodded his head.
She looked apprehensively as the captain approached the cage and shook
violently as he opened it.

“Out!” he ordered,
jerking his thumb.

“P-please,” she
begged, terrified that he was going to force her to do things to him
again. Dirty, un-natural things, that
made her die inside.

“Oh, don’t you
worry, my sweet,” he mocked. “Yer goin’
to be treated like a queen today.” He
pushed her roughly towards his cabin, looking daggers at a couple of his men
who went to touch Celia.

“Not so high an’
mighty now, are we?” Syndony remarked scornfully, looking Celia up and down as
the former noivce entered the cabin.
“Thought you were better than anyone else, didn’t yer?style="mso-spacerun: yes"> Well, you ain’t no more.”

“I will style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>always be better than you,” Celia whispered defiantly.

“You little…!”
Syndony flew across the cabin, hand raised as if to strike the younger woman,
but Stockton was too quick and grabbed her wrist, making the madame yelp with
pain.

“You will not mark
her,” he growled menecingly, pushing her violently away.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “You,” he barked at Celia.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “Go an’ get dressed – in there.”style="mso-spacerun: yes"> He indicated a side cabin, disinterestedly
before changing his mind and going to stand in the doorway as Celia picked up a
dress of the finest dark blue silk.

“Y-you want me to
wear this?” she asked incredulously.
“Why?”

“Because today, my
little nun, you are goin’ ter be sold to th’highest bidder.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> An’ then…” Stockton walked towards her, a
lecherous smile on his lips. “Then
yer’ll wish you were still on board with me,” he chuckled, running the back of
his hand down her cheek and continuing down until it grazed her nipple.

Celia gulped,
trying hard not to cry in front of the despicable man and she turned away so
Stockton could not see her tears of shame and terror, and pulled the now hated
dress on.

“Let me do yer laces,”
he purred in her ear as he pulled the cords at the back of the dress tightly,
accentuating her voluptuous figure.

“You will rot in
hell,” she hissed through clenched teeth.
“I just hope it’s soon.”

“Ooh, our timid
little nun has bite,” he laughed. “Maybe
I should style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'>keep ya fer myself – break ya in, eh?”

“I would sooner
die,” Celia snarled, pulling away from him.

“There will be far
worse than me out there, today,” Stockton shrugged. “After I’ve made what I can from yer, ya can do what yer
like.” He roved his eyes appreciately
over her once more before turning and striding from the cabin.

“Stupid cow,”
Syndony goaded. “All yer preaching and
piety, an’ look where it’s got you.”

“I’m being forced
to be like you, what’s your excuse?” Celia sniped, a half smile on her face as
the other woman looked about to explode, but the smile faded as half a dozen
crewmen came into the cabin, three heading for her and three for Syndony.

“What the fuck do
you think you’re doing, you fools!” Syndony screeched, struggling as they went
to drag her from the cabin. “She’s the
one being sold!”

“As are you,” came
Stockton’s voice from the main deck.
“Yer good, Syn, but not good enough fer me ter want ter keep ya.”

“You bastard!” she
cried, trying in vain to escape the clutches of the men.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “I hate you!”

“Not what ya said
last night,” the pirate crowed, winking at his crewmen who joined in the
raucous laughter.

Celia followed
quietly behind, knowing it was useless to put up a struggle.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> What was going to happen would happen,
whether she fought like a cat or not.
She idly wondered whether to accidentlystyle='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'> cut herself - make her appearance less
attractive, but realised desolately that it wasn’t her appearance that made her
saleable. The sight of other women who
had been captured and held in the hull, where they were obviously used and
abused by the men, brought fresh tears to her eyes and she prayed for them,
prayed that they would somehow find some escape from the wretched situation
which they had all found themselves in.
But Celia was starting to think that prayers did not work any more, or
that God had turned away from her.

“Wait!” Stockton
ordered as she was about to climb on to the bosun’s chair.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> Celia flinched as he approached her and
pulled something from his coat pocket, placing it around her neck.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “There,” he smirked as her rosary nestled in
her clevage. “Sets it off nicely.”

Celia did not know
whether to laugh or cry at the return of her beads, so decided to draw some
comfort from the familiar feeling of them, working them in her fingers as the
chair was lowered to a boat, waiting to take her to her fate.

style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'>…

“Come on,” Davy
Stockton urged the crowd gathered at style='mso-ansi-font-size:12.0pt;mso-ascii-font-family:Georgia;mso-hansi-font-family:
Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:"Lucida Sans Unicode"'>L’Ancre Bleu.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “She’s a bone fide virgin, fer gawds
sake! She’s worth more than thirty
guineas, surely?”

“Thirty one,” a voice called at the back of the room
amidst murmurings, some of agreement, some of dissent.

“Thirty one guineas t’be th’first ter plough her?style="mso-spacerun: yes"> Yer insult me, Captain Clarke.”style="mso-spacerun: yes"> Stockton was feeling desperate.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> He had spread word around for the past week
about the sale, and although it was well attended, the men seemed reluctant to
spend their money – he had not made half as much as he had hoped and now there
was just his star lot, Celia, left and he badly wanted to recoup his losses
through her.

“Forty doubloon,” came another voice from the side of
the makeshift stage on which Stockton and Celia, plus a couple of crewmen, were
standing.

“That’s not much more than I offered,” the first voice
protested.

“No, but it is more,” Stockton declared.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “Any other bids?”

“One hundred guineas,” another voice drawled and the
room gasped with shock.

“One hundred?” Stockton spluttered.

“That is what I offered, is it not?”

“Any more offers?” Stockton enquired hopefully.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “Sold, to…?”

class=usertext1>…

Celia was aware in the deep corners of her mind, to where
she had retreated, that she was being dragged from the stage and guessed that
she had been sold. She surpressed a
shudder and tried to draw back again but the trance had been broken and she
became more aware of the commotion going on around her as she was bustled
towards someone.

“I’ll be havin’
th’dress back,” Stockton informed her buyer as they reached him.

“I’ll send it over
before I sail.”

“Here’s yer virgin, then,” the pirate chuckled, pushing Celia
towards the man, frowning as she promptly fainted at his feet.

…

Oops – another cliffie… (looks innocent – and fails
miserably…)

*Forty dubloon is slightly less than 30 guineas