My Pearl [Black Sails]

Chapter Two

(Charles)

I woke in the middle of the night, unsure of what had disturbed my slumber. My gaze fell on a chair on the opposite side of the room where my coat was neatly draped. I'd left my coat with Fiona. She'd successfully been in my room without disturbing my slumber. I got up slowly and went to touch it to see if it was still warm to determine how long ago, she'd left it and if she were the reason I woke up.

It was cold, it had been here a while. I slipped my arms through the sleeves and decided to take a walk around the deck to check on things before heading back to bed. Hastily, I shoved my boots onto my feet and exited my room heading to the main deck.

As I stepped into the cool night air, I felt my heart stutter in my chest as I spotted a splash of luminescent white near the hull of the ship. My heart dropped as I saw the delicate pearl balancing atop the railing of the hull. She seemed to be in somewhat of a daze. My body moved before I could think and I raced toward her. I caught her thin wrist in my hand and wrenched her down.

A soft squeak escaped her and she toppled off the railing and fell into my open arms. She was still in nothing more than the flimsy practically see through white shift that hardly consisted of much fabric at all. Her lips had a faint blueish hue from the cold.

"Don't do that, it's dangerous." I growled at her before wondering why whoever was at the helm hadn't tried to stop her. I glanced back at the helm and frowned as I realized the wheel was locked in place but no one was manning it. "What the hell?"

She followed my gaze and out of the corner of my eye, I noticed bruising on her arms and around her mouth. Her lip was busted and bleeding. She looked to the unmanned helm and I felt her shiver in my arms. I grew more observant and noticed there was blood on her hands.

"What happened?" I asked her as I carried her toward the helm.

"He tried to hurt me." Her voice was whisper soft as she lightly pulled at the bandages around her neck as if they were irritating her. I ascended the steps to the helm with the bloodied pearl in my arms. "Vienna said we were free and we didn't have to...do those things anymore if we didn't want to..."

I guessed what had happened and felt a spark of rage within me as I realized one of my crew went against my orders. If he was still alive, I'd kill him for disobeying me. As I reached the top of the stairs, I spotted the body of one of my men lying face down on the upper deck in a pool of blood.

Fiona shivered again and turned her head away from the gory sight, burying her face in my neck. I set her down atop a crate and shrugged out of my jacket before draping it over her trembling frame, "keep it this time." I sighed before going to inspect the body.

The moment I touched him to roll him over to see how bad the damage was, his body lurched and he let out a moan of pain. His dark eyes were wild with pain and widened as he spotted me. "C-Captain, that demon witch-."

"Did you disobey my order?" I asked him as I rolled him onto his back. He had a stab wound in his chest but it was a wound I'd seen others recover from so knew it probably wouldn't kill him if he got proper treatment. I saw his knife lying on the deck a few feet away and imagined the little pearl had been spooked by what she'd done, panicked and dropped the knife before running away to find a way to calm down.

"What?" He winced in pain. "Captain, I need a docto-."

"Did you disobey my order? I said they were all to be left alone." I growled down at him.