The Devil's Temptress: At World's End || Book 3

IX. The Locker

Light. The thing which woke her was light and then the sensation of drowning followed by a warm wash of water she was submerged in. She couldn't breath but it didn't hurt until she surfaced, when that first breath was made and it felt like razor blades running down her throat.

Nicolette felt a hand on her arm, pulling her up and holding her until she found her feet and was able to stand above the waves. It was Barbossa but he wasn't even watching her as she tried to catch her breath, already too busy scanning the land they had been washed up on.

Sand. All she could see was sand through her eyes as they cracked open to get their first glimpse of the locker. It was nothing at all like she had expected. She had pictured darkness, like the inside of a chest, and the smell of damp and rotting flesh. But this was nothing like that, this was the total opposite.

"This truly is a Godforsaken place." Nic heard Gibbs grumble from her right as he clambered ashore and squinted past the suns shine towards the dunes. Elizabeth wasn't far behind him.

"I don't see Jack, I don't see anyone."

"He's here." Barbossa nodded, finally letting go of Nicolette's arm as she stood fully and finally made her way out of the shallows and towards the beach. "Davy Jones never once gave up that what he took."

"It doesn't matter, we're trapped here by your doing, no different than Jack." Wading through water after an ordeal best forgotten already had her in a less than accepting mood, and hearing the boys whiny little complaints so early in the day did not help.

She wanted to smack him or at least splash him with the water draining from her boots but before she could the voodoo priestess turned to them from further up the shore, a white shelled grabbed balanced delicately in her hand.

"Witty Jack is closer than you think."

On cue, the sand at the very top of the large dunes ahead started to slide. There was a rumble though it was low and sounded more like the hiss of one hundred snakes slithering up the sand. Before long, as Nicolette's eyes stayed trained on the single spot of sand, a black spot appeared over the dunes. The spot quickly grew into a stick, and then a mast and then a mast with sails until the Black Pearl was fully revealed and sliding smoothly over the sands. It crossed the beach and then hit the water causing small waves which barely made a sound.

It wasn't possible. It was unordinary. It was a dream, deaths dream.

Nicolette had watched the Pearl be destroyed, been aboard as it was ripped apart and shredded around her. It had been dragged down to the depths and wrecked beyond repair... However there she was in all her glory without a scratch.

"You have got to be kidding?" The words left her in a breathless whisper as she stared out, unblinking at the only place she had ever called home.

"Impossible."

"Boat." She heard Ragetti utter from behind her and scoffed. The Pearl was no boat, but she had passed all of Nicolette's high expectations from the ship by surviving.

Slap me thrice and hand me to me momma, it's Jack!" Nic glanced at Gibbs as he took off down the beach towards the figure she only just then noticed. She had been so shocked she had not seen the small figure stood proudly on the mast as it glided by, not had she even that same figure jumping from the Pearl to begin wading towards them.

"It's the captain!" Nicolette caught Elizabeth grin and start down the beach before she halted almost instantly, frowning. Good. Even after their little heart to heart the night before she still had no right.

Nic herself however had the exact same problem moving and as many of the crew ran towards Jack she found herself stuck. It was like the beach beneath her had turned into quicksand and was holding her in place, pulling her back as a Jack walked forward.