Chapter X - Bollocks to Literary Convention
 
 

    "Cac capaill!" Granuaile yelled, between swings of her enormous two-handed sword. "Don't they ever stop?!"
    "It's like they're coming out of the woodwork," said Kidd, clutching at his hat as he ducked an oncoming chair.
    "Like daisies!" Jack added, only slightly distracted.
    "Uh, no, Jack, I don't think that--" Kidd was cut short by the necessity to block another man's sword with his own. "Jesus!"
    They had made it out onto the streets now, which gave them a little more breathing space, but the attackers were still flooding in from all directions. The four pirate captains had given up trying to keep counts of slain crew to stay focused on the battle, which wasn't so much going their away or against their way as just going. On and on.
    "Any ideas what prompted this?" Jack shouted to his comrades, running an attacker through with his blade and catching the hilt of another with his spare hand.
    "No idea," said Inigo, who was fighting his way up onto a bridge now. "Suppose we should ask them?"
    "Don't seem to be in much of a conversational mood," said Jack, sidling up the bridge as well, fending off the half-dozen opponents following after him. "'Ere, any of you blokes up to tellin' us your possible motive?" he asked them cheerfully.
    "Die, you son of a whore!"
    "See?" Jack said to Inigo. "At least we know the ships'll be in good shape. There's nothing that can sneak up on three legend'ry ships and 'spect to win."
    "Maybe, but we left Fezzik in charge."
    "Well... maybe we'll get lucky, hey?" He jumped to avoid the sword being swung at his legs. "Shouldn't do that, mate. Man's on a set of stairs, you know he's gonna do that," he told his attacker.
    "Don't give them tips!" Inigo hissed.
    "They'll never learn elsewise," Jack said defensively.
    "That's a good thing!"
    "Really? Oh yeah..."
    "I don't like you when you're drunk," Inigo grumbled.
    "Good; I don't like you when you are, either. Makes ye forget the difference between a pillow and a man's arse."
    "For the last time, that was a mistake!" the Dread Pirate Roberts howled, punctuating his sentence with a fierce slash of his sword, neatly splitting the nearest man's chest from shoulder to liver. "Now look what you did-- You got blood on me!" he complained, looking down at his black silk shirt.
    "I did that?" Jack demanded, blocking one opponent's sword and kicking him in the groin. "Maybe if y'didn't fuss over yer clothes like a bloody girl you'd not have a reason to whine like 'un!"
    "Is that so? And which one of us wears women's cosmetics again?"
    "You give it time, Roberts," Jack said through gritted teeth, as he continued backing up, eventually colliding with something that felt like a body, and then a stone wall. "It'll be all the rage soon enough, you mark me."
    Somewhere far below him, there was a splash.
    "Nothing to say to that, hey?" Captain Sparrow said with triumph. He continued to cross swords to the pirates coming out him, a pleased expression on his face, which faded as he noticed there seemed significantly more pirates around to deal with than there should be. "Roberts? Little help?" He chanced a glance over his shoulder, noting the distinct absence of any dread pirate-shaped figures. "Roberts? Come on now..." He turned his head and glanced over the side of the bridge. "You've got to be joking..."

    An Irish two-hander couldn't be called the Irish version of the Scottish claymore because to an Irishman, a Scot was a step away from an Englishman, and any self-respecting Irishman would loathe being compared to anything English. It was a betrayal of principle.
    Nevertheless, an Irish version of a claymore was essentially what a two-hander was, whether the user was in the mood for admitting it or not. It was a large, broad sword with a long hilt meant to support its weight with both the user's hands, a thin guard and an open-faced pommel. Contrary to what sword displays in upper-class houses may suggest, however, the blades were not as shiny and reflective as a mirror, being too dented and rusted from blood to achieve this. Unlike the swords of some other cultures, Celtic swords got used.
    Granuaile was presently using hers quite a lot. It had been a while since she'd sharpened the edges so she was met with a little resistance slashing through the bodies of her enemies, but the problem of this lie mostly on their end in that said end was more painful, because Granuaile wasn't lacking in strength, no matter what her grandmotherly visage suggested.
    She caught a man by the neck of his shirt in passing, and knowing, perhaps on instinct, that the pirate was one of hers, said, "Cá bhfuil an Caiftín Kidd?"
    "Ni cá bhfuil an Sasanach," the Irish pirate said nervously, seeming to debate whether he should wait for her to drop him back down to the ground or try to wrestle free himself. The matter was decided for him quite quickly as Granuaile released her grip. "Muidne ag éirí go dona liom," he added, as he recovered his balance. As long as he was here, he might as well report.
    "An ea?" Granuaile asked, hefting her sword one-handed. As it came to land on her shoulder, it struck the forehead of an attacker that had been sneaking up from behind. "Keep an eye out for the others," she told her underling, whose attention was fixed on the crumpled form by Granuaile's feet. "I'll see you later." She went into a bow, meaning the tip of her two-hander dragged along the chest of a second attacker and sliced through his flesh from belly to throat, and then she sped off.
    "Granuaile truly is a great woman," the young pirate said in wonder, staring at the two prone bodies his captain had left behind. He got out his pistol to finish them off. It was only proper, after all.
    The captain of the Tirghráthóir swung her two-hander in a wide arc to clear a path in front of her, sending her opponents flying in every direction. More came towards her, so she swung again, and this time was shocked to find her sword blocked by another.
    "'Ere, I know you," the swordsman said. He was a small, greasy man with shaggy black hair and ratlike eyes. "You're ol' Grace O'Malley, Irish pirate 'xtrodinaire."
    "Aye."
    "You ain't on this case, are ya? The agency speffically stated only one group atta time was to go after Jack Sparrow--"
    "Is that what this is?" Granuaile demanded. "Head-hunting?"
    "Well, yeah. Wotcher think it was, grandmother?"
    Granuaile smiled. "Tchim..." She shifted her grip on her sword a little.
    "Eh?"
    She swung back, blade going over her shoulder and stopping a mere inch from her neck, and then forward with full force, slicing through the pirate's neck so cleanly he probably couldn't even feel it. Much.
    At least, that was her intention. She seemed to be stuck on the blade being over her shoulder. She pulled a little, puzzled at what the hold-up was, and eventually twisted her head around to meet the gaze of a very large man built quite possibly out of stone bricks, holding the broad blade of her sword still with one hand. He did not smile, even when she gave him a nervous grin.
    Always resourceful, however, Granuaile half-spun around and swung her foot up to connect with the man's groin.
    He didn't budge. Her foot, on the other hand, hurt like hell.
    "Look," she said, addressing the alledged leader of the attacking pirates, "maybe we can work something out."
    "Simply amazing, O'Malley. Didn't know you was in for being a cutthroat. Stealin' someone else's job, hones'ly--"
    He may have said more after that, but he may have found difficulty in doing this under a pile of crates that had just landed on top of him, a result of a completely unrelated event involving some other pirates that aren't interesting enough to describe in battle. After all, just because they inadvertedly save an important person's life doesn't mean they're due any fifteen minutes.
    The fortunate thing was that at the same time as the crate incident, William Kidd had successfully snuck up behind Granuaile's other assailant and run him through with his cutlass. It wasn't really an Achilles's Heel moment, but it ranked up there somewhere.
    "My thanks," Granuaile muttered, prying her sword from the corpse's grip.
    "Don't worry," Kidd said kindly. "I know Mister Sparrow would be in a right state if he learned I'd failed to assist you, madam. Consider it a public service. Besides that, you and I have similar aims in mind, do we not? It would be in our best interests to assist each other."
    The Irishwoman nodded gravely. "True indeed. However, Mister Kidd, do you really feel you can trust a Gael?"
    "Oh, I don't trust girls at all as a general rule."
    "..."
    "Sorry, is there something on my face?"
    Granuaile gave her most dramatic, exasperated sigh, and changed the subject. "I think it would be best at present to clean up here. Starting with this man," she said, pointing with her two-hander at the pinned hunter captain. "Help me search him. He'll have king's letters on him."
    "Just how are we to put an end to this current fray, madam? Killing them en masse doesn't seem to do much to discourage them, so I fail to see how slaying their captain will improve matters."
    "No, no. It isn't about convincing all them, Mister Kidd. We need only to convince him. How is your blade?"
    "Er, sharp?"
    "We'll use mine, then."

    Grunting a little under the strain, Jack pulled the rest of Inigo's drenched body out of the river, and promptly collapsed beside him, wheezing.
    "What kind of pirate captain," he said to Inigo, wiping wet strands of hair from his eyes, "doesn't know how to swim?"
    "I thought I'd pick it up as I went along?" Inigo tried. Jack rolled his eyes and proceeded to wring the water out of his sleeves. "Hey. How come your cosmetics haven't run?"
    True to his observation, the kohl smudges surrounding Jack's eyes had not washed away with the water at all.
    "S'enchanted," Jack explained.
    "That's the most ridiculou--"
    "Zombie monkeys."
    "You use that excuse for everything."
    "That's because it works so exceedingly well."
    They helped each other stand up, a slow-going effort with a lot of stops and starts, and perhaps more than a fair amount of accusations of one party going too far in overstepping the line into the other party's personal space. Finally more or less upright, they were just about to congratulate themselves on the achievement when the shriek of a sword being drawn caught their attention. They snapped their heads around, away from the river and toward the docks, where a large group of unfamiliar pirates stood in a menacing huddle, the forefront of these having been the one to have drawn his weapon.
    "'Allo, gents. How's about coming along with us to see our good Captain Peregrine?"
    ("I'm starting to spot a theme here..." Jack muttered, not loud enough for anyone but himself to hear.)
    "I'll take them," Inigo said, picking up his sword.
    "No, I will," said Jack.
    "Don't make an issue out of this," Inigo said testily.
    "You're the one making an issue of it. Just let me handle it, all right?"
    "No, it's not all right. You always do this!"
    The opposite group of pirates looked at each other in puzzlement. Then, they shrugged, and started advancing as the two pirate captains continued their argument.
    "Fine. If it means that much to you, I'll jan-ken ye for it."
    The lead pirate swung his sword. Jack, preoccupied with his game of rock-paper-scissors with Inigo, blocked it without notice. Confused, the man struck again, only to again have his sword blocked without effort.
    Slow to catch on to certain concepts, the pirates decided the best thing to do at this point was to rush them.
    "Best two outta three?" Jack suggested, parrying another swing.
    "If you insist," Inigo replied, oblivious to having just cut off two of a man's fingers when his rapier slipped past the guard of the other man's sword. "Bear in mind I have Sicilian Reasoning on my side."
    By this point, as the pirates had to climb over their fallen comrades to reach Jack Sparrow and the Dread Pirate Roberts, it was slowly sinking in that something wasn't right about the current situation. But they kept running anyway.
    "Best three out of five?" Inigo offered.
    The two captain's arms were starting to ache. Jack hmphed. "Let's settle it here and now. Pick a number 'tween one and ten."
    At this time it had finally dawned on the pirates the errors in their ways. Unfortunately, by then there was only one pirate left. He looked around uneasily.
    "Five."
    "Sorry. Win goes to me," Jack said triumphantly, turning to face his opponents with an eager grin. It fell immediately as his eyes landed on the single straggler, and then on the pile of bodies by his feet. "Did I miss something?"
    "Hey," Inigo said, returning Jack's attention upwards. "He's running away."
    The two men looked at each other. They shrugged. They ran after him.

    It didn't take much to trail after the pirates. All you had to do was go where everyone was going: a square, with a tall-walled fountain in the center, surrounded by a huge crowd of people including townsfolk as well as pirates. Jack caught sight of Granuaile immediately and sidled over to her.
    "Ah," he said. "Grace. Just who I wanted to see. All we need to do is kill off the rest of these, and--"
    "There's a slight problem, Jack," Granuaile said reluctantly, fiddling with the pommel of her sword.
    "What?"
    She jutted her head slightly in the direction of the fountain. Jack followed it. Standing on the high wall of the fountain was a flabby, pink-faced pirate in a broad-rimmed hat, presently holding onto the quartermaster Anamaria with a pistol to her forehead. Anamaria stood very still, hands fidgeting behind her back.
    Granuaile saw it immediately, the change that came over Jack's demeanor then. The hardened eyes, the tightened lips. She'd seen him go that way before, when he'd rescued her, a long time ago on far-off shores...
    He pushed the crowd to either side of him to clear a path to the front. Inigo and Granuaile followed after him nervously.
    "Don't come any closer," Anamaria's kidnapper warned, in a high-pitched squeal. "I'll kill her, I will."
    "All right," Jack said calmly. He kept stepping forward.
    "Wha-- Stop! Stop!" the pirate begged. "That's not how it's supposed to go!"
    "How do you mean?" Jack asked innocently.
    "Meaning that you're supposed to lose your spine and buckle at the knees and offer me anything to let her go!"
    "Is that so?" Jack exchanged glances with his fellow pirate captains, who looked equally perplexed. "Were we planning on doing anything like that?" he asked them.
    "No," said Granuaile.
    "Not that I know of," Inigo put in.
    "There you have it," Jack told the kidnapper, shrugging. "Are you planning on killing her? Only, today would be nice. We can't tolerate all this hold-up."
    The kidnapper's lip trembled. "F-fine! You want to be brave for her sake? That's fine with me! She'll just break free of my capture at a dramatic moment and lay me to waste. Won't you?" he added, to Anamaria.
    "Actually, the thought hadn't occured to me," Anamaria confessed.
    "What? Look!" the pirate said, pulling the gun away and looking at her face to face. "When a lady gets captured she either is spared by some knight in shining armor, or she cracks down on her capturer herself. It's how it goes, all right? All the books say so. You're completely ruining the conventions of literature here!"
    "Oh..." Anamaria said reproachfully, looking down at her boots. "I'm awfully, awfully sorry, mister. How can I ever make it up to--"
    BANG!
    A sharp smell of gunpowder, and, blood streaming from the side of his head, the pirate fell back into the water with an enormous splash, drenching the Black Pearl's quartermaster. She gasped in disgust and looked around the square, until she caught sight of William Kidd hanging from a second-story balcony ten yards away.
    "I was about to handle it!" she snapped at him.
    "Sorry," Kidd said.
    Anamaria huffed and climbed down from the fountain, dejected. She joined Jack and the others, who had procured a coat from an unwitting townsperson and offered it to her for warmth, which she refused.
    "I think we've about wrapped everything up here," Jack said, loud enough for the others in the square to hear. "Your Captain Peregrine's given the order to retreat, so you mates better make a hasty get-away before some of us get a little trigger-happy, savvy?" Some reluctant figures filtered out of the crowd toward the docks.
    "How'd you know Peregrine had ordered a retreat?" Granuaile asked, amazed.
    "Oh, he had?"
    Granuaile tried to make sense of this one until the headache got too bad. "Look, he was a pirate hunter, Jack. We found his papers. They include documents stating he was officially assigned to your case."
    "A nice way to say he's been ordained by the king to cut off me head," said Jack. "Yes, as I was saying, it would appear high time we clear out of this town. Ana, get the fund together and buy up what you can. We're setting sail for Pointe-Noire by midn-- What's wrong?"
    "The money," said Anamaria, stricken and pale. "I forgot-- I lost the money, Jack."
    "What, all of it?"
    Anamaria averted her eyes out of shame. "I'm so sorry, Jack!"
    "What? No, look, s'all right," he said, bracing her shoulders. "I expected we'd dig into a bit o' me personal funds for this trip. It's to be expected."
    "You mean..." Anamaria stammered.
    "Let's see..." Jack said, looking upward at nothing while his lips moved in thought, "Yawri Bay's, what, about twenty miles to the South of here?"
    "Not one of your caches!" his quartermaster pleaded.
    "Why not? I can do with one less. We'll set a pair of men to rowing in, and I'll give 'em the map I made up. Gracie, can you put one of your tracking charms on it so's we can ascertain it doesn't get lost? It worked so well when I did it last time."
    "Of course, Jack." Granuaile hesitated, for something had just struck her as odd. "What last time?"
    "Err, a while ago. After I'd gotten back from El Dorado, I figured, who needs this map I had me guide draw up? Not I. So I thought I'd put a charm on it and barter it off at a port in Spain and see where it ended up. Eventually these two blokes got it, I think, sailed off and used it, then one of them tore it up. Can you imagine! I'd've liked to give the men who did that a good--"
    "Wait a minute," Inigo said tersely. "You created the map that the famous marauders Tulio and Miguel used to get to El Dorado?"
    "Well, the guide drew it, mate--"
    "How old are you?!"
    "Never you mind that. Back to Yawri Bay, any idea who y'wanna send along to it?"
    "Well-- I suppose Will Turner is--"
    "Excellent. And I'll pitch in Delphine."
    "Done and done."
    "Excuse me," Delphine called out, somewhere amid the crowd. "But do I get any say in this?"
    "No," the two men responded at once.
    "Now get going," Jack ordered. "Fetch your brother and get a boat ready. Anamaria, you go with her and get her the proper map and some supplies, right?"
    "I think I've missed something vital here," Anamaria said slowly.
    "That's the spirit," said Jack, slapping her on the back.
    "And I don't think you're listening to a word I'm saying."
    "Tomorrow, actually."
    The whole crowd flinched at the crack of Anamaria's palm against Jack's cheek.
    "Sorry," Anamaria told him, as he staggered back, dizzy. "Had to do it."
    "I believe you."
 

End Chapter X

Chapter XI

Chapter IX