𝐂 𝐇 𝐀 𝐏 𝐓 𝐄 𝐑 𝐅 𝐎 𝐔 𝐑
[ 𝑝𝑜𝑟𝑡 𝑡𝑜𝑟𝑡𝑢𝑔𝑎 ]
𝐿𝐼𝐿𝐿𝐼𝐴𝑁 𝑆𝑃𝐸𝑁𝑇 𝑇𝐻𝐸 𝑅𝐸𝑀𝐴𝐼𝑁𝐷𝐸𝑅 𝑂𝐹 𝑇𝐻𝐸 𝐸𝑉𝐸𝑁𝐼𝑁𝐺 𝑈𝑁𝐴𝐵𝐿𝐸 𝑇𝑂 𝑇𝐻𝐼𝑁𝐾 𝑂𝐹 𝐴𝑁𝑌𝑇𝐻𝐼𝑁𝐺 𝐵𝑈𝑇 𝑇𝐻𝐸 𝑈𝑁𝐿𝐼𝐾𝐸𝐿𝑌 𝑃𝐴𝐼𝑅'𝑆 𝑅𝐸𝑄𝑈𝐸𝑆𝑇.
Even as she turned the last of the patrons out onto the cobbles, swinging at the air in front of their noses and stumbling with every step, Will's last words echoed back in her mind. Come with us, Lillian. Perhaps if she hadn't turned to look at him as he spoke - if she hadn't caught the almost imperceptible glimmer of longing in his eyes, for the freedom of the years they'd shared in Port Royal – then she would've been happy to continue ignoring Jack's outrageous offer. But coming from Will's lips, Lillian couldn't deny that it sounded much more intriguing.
As she stacked up the chairs around the tavern and splashed down the grime-coated floorboards with buckets of water which soaked the hems of her skirts through, she began to ponder for the first time in her life, the possibility of actually breaking her mother's one and only rule.
For such a highly strung and ferocious woman Aoife Lysander had, for the most part, allowed Lillian to make, and in turn learn from, her own mistakes throughout her childhood – though there had of course been that isolated incident during which Lillian had found herself on the roof of a rum storehouse whilst it went up in flames. Aoife hadn't taken too kindly to that one, especially after people in town began to accuse her of trying to destroy an opposing business via foul play. But nobody had ever managed to prove that Lillian had actually had anything to do with the fire itself, and plus it had been Will's fault anyway – she'd just taken the fall. Come to think of it, there had been many a time when she'd offered herself up for punishment to save him.
She really would've done anything for William Turner back in those days. And it unnerved her to realise that here she was, seriously considering doing it all over again, even though the mission was practically suicide.
Even though it was incredibly likely he had fallen for Elizabeth Swann during her absence.
A heavy sigh escaped her lips and she shook her head to rid herself of the thought – now was not the time to be worrying about the Governor's daughter. No, it was the time to be worrying about whether or not Aoife would lock her in the rum cellar until her thirtieth birthday if Lillian decided to finally defy her mother and board a ship.
She'd always been fascinated by the beautiful vessels which docked in the various ports she'd inhabited over the years, even before her mother had finally let her in on the story of her late father - a merchant sailor from Aberdeen, who'd sailed his crew to the lights of Galway for a spot of fun before setting off for the New World. Apparently Aoife had been so taken with the young Quartermaster that she'd followed him all the way across the seven seas to the Caribbean, and they'd settled themselves in a nearby port to raise their newborn daughter. They would've been a perfect family, if only the sailor hadn't failed to return from his next voyage, his ship drawn and quartered by a fierce storm - her father had drowned at sea when Lillian was barely six months old.
It seemed Aoife was determined her daughter would not meet the same fate – and so Lillian had been confined to port her entire life. The shallow waters which surrounded the docks were as far as she was allowed, and if she so much as hinted at leaving the bay by any means which did not involve a horse and dry land, Aoife would take no pity in shutting her down on the spot.
Until recent years that had never been a problem – Lillian was quite content to remain ashore, listening intently to each and every sordid tale of life at sea recounted by the pirates who frequented Lysander's. The vast majority of them happened to be excellent storytellers, though she'd always had one particular favourite.
The adventures of Captain Jack Sparrow were wild and numerous, and made all the more exciting when told by the man himself, so she'd always been thrilled to see that familiar face enter the tavern. In fact, when her mother had noticed just how much her eyes lit up every time he walked through the doors, Aoife had been convinced Lillian was developing some kind of teenage crush. Of course that hadn't been the case, much to Aoife's relief, but it didn't mean that she wasn't enthralled by the strange pirate, with his gold-toothed grin and his magic compass. Still, even the infamous Captain Jack Sparrow had not truly been able to kickstart her longing for the life she had heard so much about but could never live.
That particular feeling had been the fault of a fast friendship, formed on her eighteenth birthday down at the beach. Marin Connelly was an odd young woman, to say the least. For a start, she dressed exclusively in men's clothes. In truth, that part wasn't all that strange – Lillian herself still preferred to don breeches and a shirt on certain days, but she could happily appreciate a pretty dress too. Marin Connelly however, despised skirts almost as much as she despised the British Navy, which was to say a fair amount. She was also a gifted merchant sailor, employed on her uncle's ship as his First Mate, and had a habit of bragging to the other patrons of the tavern about it after a couple of rums. Marin had once told her that she believed herself to be the only woman First Mate in the Caribbean, and although Lillian wasn't quite sure how accurate that statement was, she still went along with it. Because her friend was proud of her position, her heritage tied to the seas.
It was in Marin that Lillian first began to see what she could've become, had her mother not kept her tethered to land. Only then had Aoife's one rule started to bother her.
Hauling the final empty rum barrel out into the alleyway at the back of the tavern, Lillian gave a heavy sigh and wiped her brow on her sleeve. Tendrils of auburn waves clung to the nape of her neck with sweat and she was incredibly glad for the day to be over and done with. She didn't yet want to think about the fact that she had to return and do it all again tomorrow.
Well, that was unless she chose to accept Jack's offer.
Down at the docks, just before ten – that was the information the Captain had passed on to her on his exit, with Will following closely at his heels and looking extremely dejected to be leaving a place of relative decency for the chaos of the streets outside. Which meant she still had time to mull everything over before she made up her mind.
"Hurry your sorry backside up, Lil, I'm bloody shattered!" Marin called from the bar. Her speech was still a little slurred, presumably thanks to the extra bottle of rum she'd shared with Jack. She may have been a sailor, but Marin's tolerance for the stuff was still considerably lower than most of Lysanders' regular customers. Lillian suspected she'd have to haul her friend off the rickety bar stool she'd occupied for the last five hours and up to her front door, which sent an instant surge of irritation through her. She loved Marin Connelly like a sister, and it was true that she'd missed the girl whilst she was away at sea, but she hadn't quite realised just how much she'd come to enjoy being able to simply walk upstairs after her shift was over, without having to drag her drunk best friend home beforehand.
"So once again you're just assuming I'm going to help you up the street?" Lillian called back into the tavern as she rolled the barrel across the alley to join the pile of others awaiting disposal. "Honestly, one of these days I'm just going to leave you to struggle!"
"You wouldn't dare!" She caught Marin's shocked face as she returned to the bar, the two of them breaking into chuckles almost immediately.
"Oh, don't doubt I would." Lillian mused. "But you're lucky today, I need to talk to you about something....Away from Niall." She added in a much lower tone, although she doubted her uncle could hear their conversation from down in the cellar.
Marin's eyebrow raised instantly and she smirked. "Oh? Do tell me, does this have anything to do with that boy I saw you talking to earlier? The pretty one who came in with Captain Sparro- And don't lie to me I know there's something going on there!" She added accusingly when Lillian suddenly busied herself with rearranging the ale mugs on the shelves.
A heavy sigh fell from Lillian's lips as she turned to face her friend once again. "Marin, that was Will Turner."
The other girl's face blanched. "That's your friend from Port Royal? Blimey Lil, I know you always said he was good looking but honestly I thought you'd just fallen for the first boy who ever spoke to you because you were fifteen!" She admitted. "You weren't joking though, I have to say! And may I remind you that this is coming from someone who'd rather walk the plank than take a man back to her cabin."
At that, Lillian snorted. Marin held her hands up in mock surrender, leaning back so far on her stool Lillian half expected her to topple off of it. "What? I'm only being honest!"
Lillian shook her head in exasperation – sometimes she wondered how she'd put up with the girl for this long without losing all sense of sanity. But she couldn't deny Marin was the closest friendship she'd had since her mother had separated her from Will five years ago, and Lillian would've been lost without her.
"Come on, Mar. Let's get you home."
As the two girls left the tavern, Lillian consistently on guard should her companion suddenly collapse to the cobbles in her intoxicated state, Marin suddenly reminded her of the problem at hand. "So, what was it you wanted to talk about without old Niall earwigging in?"
Lillian considered her words for a moment – despite her being sailor herself and all, she still wasn't sure how Marin would take the news. After all, she'd been trying to convince Lillian to head out to sea for the entire time they'd known each other, but she'd never agreed to it. Yet now Jack had arrived in Tortuga in search of a crew and, thanks to one William Turner, her mind was almost made up on the matter.
She could no longer deny that she wanted nothing more than to race down to the jetty come the new dawn, blade and pistol in tow, and finally set foot on deck. Even as they walked down the steep incline towards Marin's small lodgings, Lillian noticed the water in the distance, glistening beneath the moonlight, and felt its call. There was something different about it now than any other night – and for the first time she found herself longing for the one thing she had never had. A connection to the father she had lost.
"Jack and the others are setting sail for the Isla de Muerta tomorrow." She took a deep breath, the next words poised on her lips. Marin simply let out a short, derisive laugh.
"Oh, he told me. Even tried to press-gang me into the bloody crew! I asked him if he'd spent too long in the sun or something." She muttered in disbelief. "Going after the Black Pearl....he's losing it, I tell you Lil..."
"I'm going with them."
Marin stopped dead, eyes wide as saucers as she stared incredulously at the girl beside her. Lillian couldn't help but smile.
And though the rant that ensued from her best friend's mouth was loud enough to wake every drunken vagrant on the streets of Tortuga, both girls knew that she wouldn't back down. Lillian was joining the crew of the Interceptor, to defy her mother's wishes and rescue Elizabeth Swann from the pirates of the Black Pearl.
But it wasn't until she was back home at the tavern, laying in her bed staring up at the ceiling and unable to sleep thanks to a heady mix of adrenaline and excitement, that she realised that she'd already made up her mind hours ago.
In truth, five years hadn't changed a thing - Will was setting sail for the Isla de Muerta in the morning, and therefore so was she.
No matter how crazy the plan, how dangerous the voyage - wherever William Turner went, Lillian Lysander would always follow.
𝐀 𝐔 𝐓 𝐇 𝐎 𝐑 ' 𝐒 𝐍 𝐎 𝐓 𝐄
So we're finally getting out of the bar and off to sea (thank god!), plus some Lillian backstory in this chapter! Any guesses on who her dad is?? (it's obvious I know haha :P) I have moved around some bits in this fic so that it fits the timeline just a warning, but you'll see how it all fits together later on! As I've said before this first part is basically a set up for characters and relationships etc but most of the main storyline takes place through DMC and AWE, so I hope this is still entertaining enough for you guys to want to read. I know it's taking a while to get somewhere and I'm sorry but I hope you're still enjoying it - I love these two to death already and I can't wait for you guys to see their arc throughout the first movie trilogy :') As always thank you so much for reading, much love - Vee x