Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales Novelization

by Elizabeth Rudnick

  And then a soldier stepped in front of her. Young and inexperienced, he tried to block Carina’s exit. It didn’t work. She spun around him and then ducked under a wagon. Moments later, she was lost among the crowd.

  Turning around, the young soldier found himself face to face with Lieutenant John Scarfield. He gulped. The lieutenant was known for his fierce temper. Tall and thick, he towered over the soldier, his eyes boring into him, asking a question without saying a word.

  “I’m sorry, sir,” the soldier said, the terror clear in his voice. “That witch escaped her chains.”

  Lightning fast, Scarfield’s hand shot out and grabbed the soldier by the throat. His long fingers squeezed tight. “You’re telling me four of my men have lost one girl?” He squeezed harder. “Perhaps this is why I was denied a fleet of my own, why I’m docked in Saint Martin instead of fighting wars in West Africa!” Scarfield threw the soldier to the ground and continued his rant. “The navy sent me here to kill witches. Now find me that wicked lass—or you’ll swing in her place.”

  The soldier scurried away, three other soldiers following close behind. Watching them go, Scarfield sighed. The day was not off to a good start. He could only hope that it would get better. His reputation, after all, was on the line.

  Mayor Dix’s reputation was on the line, as well. Standing in front of the newly constructed Royal Bank, he stared over the gathered crowd. It was his moment. With the dedication of the bank, he would solidify himself as a man of importance.

  He had wasted years on that rock in the middle of the sea, his talents as a politician squandered. He governed over sailors and drunks and a handful of elite. He had to contend with the ever-constant threat of pirates and, of late, a rash of apparent witch sightings. He was tired of it all and he believed himself unappreciated. But that was going to change. Having a secure bank with ties to the continent meant more people of means would be attracted to Saint Martin. The mayor could rid the island of the riffraff and make it a destination for the wealthy.

  Looking over his shoulder, he eyed the Royal Bank. It was a simple box-shaped structure made of wood. The mayor knew the outside was, well, uninspired. But what was on the inside was what truly mattered.

  Turning back around, he raised his hands, silencing the crowd. “Today,” he began, “we dedicate the Royal Bank of Saint Martin—the most secure banking institution in the Caribbean!” Behind him, two royal guards pulled open the bank’s doors to reveal a shiny new vault inside. There were oohs and aahs from the crowd as they craned their necks to see. “Our new vault is five inches thick, stands as tall as any man, and weighs an imperial ton. Ladies and gentlemen, with this bank the town of Saint Martin enters the modern world, as no man or army will ever rob her gold!” He paused, letting the excitement build. Then he nodded to a skinny man standing inside the bank. The bank manager nodded back. “Open the vault!” Mayor Dix shouted as the crowd cheered.

  Pulling down on the handle, the bank manager swung open the heavy door.

  Instantly, the crowd got quiet. In the silence, Mayor Dix heard the unmistakable sound of snoring.

  Slowly, he turned around. His eyes narrowed and his cheeks grew red. For there, lying across the top shelf of the vault, sound asleep, as though he had not a care in the world, was Captain Jack Sparrow. The infamous pirate looked worse for the wear. His clothes were filthier than usual. His boots were caked in mud, and his long jacket had several holes in various places. Some of the dark kohl smudged along his eyes had run down his cheeks. In his dreadlocked hair his usual assortment of trinkets hung at various lengths.

  Physically, the man might have seemed down on his luck. However, at that particular moment, he was wearing a blanket of gold coins, and dangling from his fingertips was a large jug of rum. For a pirate like Jack, that was the good life.

  “Pirate!” screamed a woman.

  The shout jolted Jack and he woke, startled. “Pirate!” he shouted back. Rolling off the shelf, he landed on the ground with a thud. Then he sat up. Confusion crossed his face as he looked out at the gathered crowd and the guards, who had now taken aim at him from the bank’s door.

  “This may seem a peculiar request,” he said, slurring a bit, “but would someone remind me as to why I’m here?”

  In response, the soldiers cocked their guns.

  “Wait, wait, wait,” Jack said, hedging, “it’s coming to me. Give me a moment to clear my head.” He lifted the jug of rum to his lips and took a long swig.

  The soldiers tightened their fingers on the triggers—

  “Hold your fire!” a soldier shouted, startling the crowd. “There’s a woman with him in the vault!”

  Sure enough, in the vault a woman sat up next to Jack. Like the pirate, she seemed confused as to her whereabouts. Her hair was disheveled and her makeup was smudged all over her face.

  “He can’t hide behind that trollop!” the mayor cried, growing impatient. Then he did a double take. The “trollop” wasn’t a trollop after all. She was his wife. “Frances?” he said, surprise giving way to a burning hot rage.

  Jack, however, was unaware of and unconcerned about the identity of his vault mate. He was much more interested in remembering just what he was doing inside a vault inside a bank on the island of Saint Martin. As he looked around for clues, his gaze landed on a set of thick ropes at his feet. They seemed to run across the vault, out onto the floor of the bank, and through two holes that had been bored into the back wall.

  Jack got to his feet, followed the ropes to the holes, and peered outside. The ropes were attached to three teams of horses that stood at the ready behind the bank. Next to them, looking nervous and antsy, was a mangy, motley crew of pirates, including Jack’s old friend and first mate, Gibbs. “Right,” Jack said, everything coming back to him. “Got it. I’m robbing the bank.” He paused. “But there was one other thing….Don’t tell me….” He raised a ringed finger to his lips and tried to remember.

  “Shoot him!”

  Instantly, the guards opened fire. As bullets flew, Jack dove to the ground. All around him, wood splintered as the new bank was riddled with bullet holes. In the back of the bank, the horses let out nervous whinnies and started to prance at the ends of their harnesses. A few reared up, chomping on their bits, and they tried to move away from the building and noise.

  Inside the bank, the ropes attached to the horses grew taught. A moment later, the vault began to slide across the floor. With a thud, it slammed hard into the back wall.

  Peeking through one of the holes, Jack Sparrow saw that the horses were straining hard against their harnesses. The pirates struggled to keep control of the large animals, but they were used to sails and masts, not horses. They didn’t know what to do.

  And then the guards fired again.

  At the same time, the horses pulled forward with all their might to get away from the terrifying sound. Jack felt the whole building begin to vibrate under his feet. The vibrations grew stronger and stronger. And then, with a loud groan followed by an even louder creaking sound, like a tree falling in the forest, the entire building began to move. The horses had pulled it completely free of its foundation.

  A perplexed look on his face, Jack stood where the bank had once been. The entire building—not just the vault—had been swept out from under his very feet. He swallowed nervously. That wasn’t good. Then he looked up. The guards had their guns aimed straight at him again. That wasn’t good, either.

  “This was not part of the plan,” he said, rather obviously, to the guards and Mayor Dix. Although it would help if I could remember the plan at all in a general sort of way, Jack added silently. He was just about to open his mouth to try to talk his way out of the situation—a skill he was rather proud of having—when he felt a sharp tug at his leg. Looking down, he saw what he had failed to notice earlier: another rope was attached to his ankle. And it was growing taut! Well, he thought just as the rope tugged and he fell to the ground, I suppose it’s time for a new plan.


  A moment later, Jack Sparrow found himself being dragged behind the now mobile bank—in a rather undignified manner, if he thought so himself—through the streets of Saint Martin. Gold coins were tossed helter-skelter from the open vault and the hole in the building. Frantically, Jack tried to grab as many as he could. But it was a rather hard task, because at the same time, he was trying to hold on to the shaking rope.

  Behind him, the guards continued to fire at the runaway bank and pirate. With each volley of gunfire, the horses went faster, frothing at their mouths, with their sides heaving. They turned a sharp corner, throwing Jack and his long rope in the opposite direction. Jack let out a shout. He was about to run into a house! Helpless to do anything, Jack found himself tossed through the window of the building and right into the middle of a family dinner. As though it were not at all unusual for a pirate to crash through a window at dinnertime, he bowed his head in greeting and grabbed a roll. A moment later he crashed out the other side of the building, just in time to watch the bank speed past him, the long rope taut. He raced after it, arms pumping, knees high, hoping the rope attached to his ankle wouldn’t sweep him off his feet again.

  To his surprise, as he followed the bank down another street, he saw that his little detour had somehow put him behind the soldiers as well as the bank. Glancing over their shoulders, the guards did a double take when they saw the pirate. Quickly, they stopped and turned their guns on him.

  Jack gulped. That wasn’t good. That wasn’t good at all. He needed to find an escape route—fast.

  Swift and Sons Chart House was one of the oldest cartography shops in Saint Martin. Sailors from all over the Caribbean went to the shop in search of reliable maps of the seas and stars. Its reputation was a source of tremendous pride to its owner, Mr. Swift, who spent a great deal of his time and resources making sure that only the best of the best purchased his merchandise. And he also made sure that he never, ever had a woman in his shop. It was, after all, a well-known fact that women and the sea were not meant to mix.

  That was why when he walked into his shop and saw Carina Smyth standing in front of the large telescope aimed out the window, he did not react the way one might expect a man to when finding an unusually beautiful woman in his presence.

  “No woman has ever handled my telescope!” he cried in indignation.

  Carina turned, an eyebrow raised. It was not the first time her femininity had been met with disdain. She shrugged it off. “Sir,” she said, ignoring Swift’s accusatory glare, “your celestial fix was off. I’ve adjusted two degrees north. Your maps will no longer be imprecise. Although you will have to start over with these.” She pointed a long, thin, graceful finger.

  Swift looked at the wall she pointed to. It was covered in maps—maps that had taken him a lifetime to create. Maps he had been selling for years as the definitive maps to the seas. And this silly girl was telling him he was wrong? He turned back to give her a piece of his mind when he noticed the metal chain dangling from her wrist. “You’re a witch,” he whispered harshly.

  “Sir, I am no witch,” Carina replied. “I simply made application to study astronomy at the university….”

  Mr. Swift looked aghast. “You what?” he asked.

  “Am I a witch for having cataloged two hundred stars?”

  Apparently she was, for once again, Mr. Swift cried out, “Witch!”

  Carina sighed. There was no use trying to reason with the man. She would have to instead appeal to his wallet. “There is a blood moon coming,” she said. “I simply need to purchase a chronometer. I’ll pay you double for selling to a woman.” She walked to a shelf and picked up the instrument. The small device used to measure time in spite of variations found at sea—like temperature, motion, and humidity—looked like a compass. She weighed it in her hands and then held out some coins.

  To her surprise, instead of taking the money, Mr. Swift pulled out a small gun. “Help!” he shouted. “There’s a witch in my shop!”

  Carina opened her mouth to insist once again that she was not a witch. But before she could say anything, a man rushed into the shop—or, rather, pranced into the shop. He had brown hair full of knots and—she squinted to be sure—what appeared to be trinkets. His heavily lidded eyes were lined with kohl, and his hands, as he waved them in front of himself, flashed with silver and gold rings. What in the world… ? Carina had just asked herself silently when again Mr. Swift let out a shout.

  “And a pirate!” he cried, answering her unasked question. “There’s a witch and a pirate in my shop!”

  “Well, then it’s your lucky day,” the pirate said with gusto. “Have either of the four of you seen my bank?”

  A moment later a building crashed through Swift and Sons, ripping the shop in two.

  “Found it!” the pirate cried as he grabbed Carina and pulled her out of harm’s way.

  Unfortunately, he pulled her onto the street—and right into view of the royal guards and Lieutenant Scarfield’s men, who had up until that point thought they had lost Carina. Seeing their prey, the combined forces started chasing them. While she wasn’t sure the pirate could be trusted—after all, she knew enough of the world to know most pirates couldn’t be—she didn’t trust Scarfield’s men to let her go. So when the pirate took off running, she followed.

  They raced down the street, turning corners where they could. Spotting a store with headless mannequins on display, the pirate grabbed Carina’s hand and led her behind them. Then he stopped and posed so that he looked like the head of the mannequin. Carina did the same.

  “Were you part of the plan?” he asked out of the corner of his mouth as the soldiers appeared and began to search for them.

  Carina furrowed her brow. “I’m not looking for trouble,” she answered.

  “What a horrible way to live,” the pirate replied.

  The pair suddenly grew quiet as one of the soldiers passed by. When he was out of earshot, Carina moved away from the mannequin. The pirate, while oddly dressed and odd in general, did seem to have rather solid street smarts. And she needed someone like that. “I need to escape,” she said. “Can you help me?”

  “That man called you a witch,” the pirate replied. “And witches are bad luck at sea.”

  “We’re not at sea,” Carina replied.

  The man nodded. “Good point,” he observed. “But I am a pirate.”

  “But I am clearly not a witch.”

  “One of us is very confused,” the pirate said.

  Carina couldn’t help agreeing. The man was clearly not of sound mind. But before she could point that out, the royal guards turned the corner. A moment later, Scarfield’s men followed.

  “Jack Sparrow!” shouted one of the guards.

  “Carina Smyth!” shouted one of Scarfield’s men.

  “Stop!” the men cried in unison.

  Carina turned to the pirate she now knew was named Jack Sparrow. He turned toward her. And then, together, they turned and ran up a set of rickety stairs. Reaching the top, they found themselves looking out over the town of Saint Martin. Below them, the soldiers began to circle the building like sharks hunting seals.

  “We’re trapped!” Carina cried. “What do we do?”

  Jack looked down at the soldiers. Then he looked at Carina. Behind the dark liner, his eyes narrowed thoughtfully. Then he nodded as if making up his mind. “You need to scream,” he said, and then, as though she were nothing of consequence, he pushed her off the roof.

  And scream Carina did—all the way down until she landed, with a very unladylike grunt, in the back of a straw wagon passing by. Hearing her scream, the soldiers turned and took off after the wagon. On the roof, Carina could just make out Jack—now alone and safe—smiling down smugly at her. “Filthy pirate!” she shouted after him. But she had to admit, filthy or not, Jack Sparrow seemed clever.

  Jack was clever. Or at least he thought so. Unfortunately, as he stood in front of the vault, staring at the single gold coin left inside, he wasn�
�t so sure his crew thought so. Turning, he looked at his men. They had gathered, as planned, on the Dying Gull, Jack’s dilapidated ship. Well, the word ship was generous. The Dying Gull, which was beached in the low tide of the shipyard, resembled an old barge more than a ship, with its cracked wood, lone cannon, and barely enough room to hold the crew—the very crew who, at that moment, seemed rather unimpressed with their captain.

  “I told you robbing a bank would be easy,” Jack said lightheartedly. He gestured to the vault. After all, he had robbed the bank. He just hadn’t gotten any of its money. “Now line up to offer your tribute, men!”

  Marty, one of Jack’s original and most loyal crew members, looked up at him in disbelief. “You want us to pay you?”

  Jack nodded.

  “We want our treasure, Captain,” Marty said, ignoring Jack’s outstretched hand. “The treasure you’ve been promising us all these years.”

  There were nods of agreement and grumbling among the crew. For years they had been following Jack out of blind loyalty. They had followed him when he’d sailed against the British navy. They hadn’t asked questions when he had gone after a ship of skeleton pirates led by the dangerous Barbossa. The crew had gone after him when Jack was captured by cannibals, and they had waited until he returned from the depths of the sea. They hadn’t even argued when Jack later befriended Barbossa. And they never questioned Jack’s dangerous journey to the Fountain of Youth, which didn’t actually result in anyone staying young forever.

  But this—this was the last straw. They had had enough. They were tired of being made fools of—for pennies, if they were lucky.

  “We will no longer follow a captain without a ship!” Bollard stated, speaking for everyone.

  Jack raised a hand to his chest as though struck by the pirate’s words. “I have a ship, gentlemen,” he said. “The Black Pearl has never left my side.” To prove his point, he opened his coat. Inside, strapped to him, was a bottle. And inside the bottle was, in fact, the Black Pearl. But it was not the Black Pearl that had brought fear to pirates and naval officers alike. It was not the ship that had once been the fastest on the seas. It was the cursed Black Pearl, now a miniature version of its original form.