I Dream of Disney (Volume II)

1. Commanding the Cannon Fire [Jack Sparrow x Reader x Cutler Beckett] Part I

Part I: The Sailors of the Storm

"Yes, she was wild, but some of us need the storm to feel safe." - Atticus

The year was 1807. I was twelve years old at the time. . . 

The world had been robbed of its colour: only sombre and dismal tones remained like a scar on the island of Barbados. Though the storm had been brewing ominously for hours, only at nightfall did it approach. Clouds thrashed on the horizon with the brutality of hunting dogs scenting fresh blood. The storm urged its horde of soupy black clouds from the island coast to the heart of the small landmass, edging from beyond where the trees speared the sky with their branches to the boundaries of the plantation where the sugar cane was being harvested. 

 The harbour bustled on without change, as it would in any normal day; cargo ships, ships sent on privateering raids returning with slaves and spoils of the day, ships wearing His Majesty's colours and ships carrying wealthy merchantmen looking for adventure on the high seas. A lone ship battled with the waters just past the horizon, where the waves and seafoam wriggled like the bodies of so many sea serpents - staying long enough only to make port, find provisions and leave when the storm was out. They would have to find it quickly in the taverns and Inns, as they were already overflowing. 

This could all be seen, and was not often not, by the Waylands. The Waylands were not, by any means, very simple people. But that in itself did not make them very pleasant. The patriarch of the family was Lord Archibald Wayland the II, a retiree commodore from the British Royal Navy who had given the Waylands wealth and a good social class from his commodore days. He was a large, pretentious and dominating man who, since retired, mostly spent his time fondling a bottle of whiskey and a large flintlock that he used every Saturday on his hunting expeditions. Unlike his wife, Lady Lydia Wayland, he much preferred the company of Charles Clintwood, the Governor of Barbados, to the company of anyone else. Lady Wayland, named after the island she hailed from, was a fetching woman with pale blond hair and narrowed serpentine eyes. She had a long, gracious neck that she mostly used to stick her nose up at the poor and crane over the fences to spy on her other wealthy neighbours. She was a proper socialite and almost always was seen in purple - outrageous shades of indigo, shocking speckles of eggplant and delicate silks in lavender. As the Lady of the house, she often organised great parties where only the best food was cooked and only the best were allowed admission. More often than not, that did not include her young ward, (Y/n) Wayland. 

(Y/n), only twelve years of age and already being groomed into a housewife, had often peered into those grand, four-poster windows with gilt edges in envy. She was not even allowed into her grandparents' common room, never less on party days when the guests all arrived in linens and silks imported from Africa, India and China - where the ladies and gentlemen had face paint smeared on their cheeks and tremendous wigs piled high on their heads. Left only to stand outside in the dizzying downpour as the lesser of two evils, lest she stays inside and be tempted by the clutter of dishes and footsteps on marble floors, the aroma of the best venison on the island and confusing mixture of perfumed necks and faces, then be tempted into going to the party. (Y/n) was staring into the windows now, using the gardener's wheelbarrow for support. Her tiny mouth opens in awe as she salivates at the thought of the "intimate party", as her grandmother had put it The tinkle of women's laughter and gunshot of men's chuckles echoes along the windowpane. She presses her face further into the glass, but not too much in fear that it shatters.

She can see her grandfather at the head of the table, his face smudged by the droplets of rain running down the glass. He is dressed in his best royal blue coat, bombarded by the frilly white cassock that shows his rank but does little to hide his overflowing double chin. He does not need to smile, so he does not, as he reaches forward for another piece of gravy-soaked meat, listening intently to Charles Clintwood as he speaks of many frivolous things that the rich concern themselves with. Governor Clintwood wears a colour similar to her grandfather and she realises he, too, must have been a Navy sailor. His wife, Mrs Clintwood, sits at his right hand. She is a beautiful lady with a large curly wig and striking green eyes, the colour of the grass snake grandfather brought home from a hunt. Her stomach is round and enormous and (Y/n) notices that she rests her hands over her stomach fondly and gently, as if in a caress for the baby inside. She talks over the table to (Y/n)'s grandmother, whose eyes burn with envy for the radiance of pregnancy. She has the most makeup of the twenty-four guests in the room; the brightest lips, the palest skin, the most intricately detailed eyebrows and the frilliest fuchsia ball gown. But she cannot change her hateful eyes, or her scowling lips from drooping as they do.