BRIZO | 𝐉𝐉 𝐌𝐚𝐲𝐛𝐚𝐧𝐤

TWENTY-TWO (II)

CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX - THE BONFIRE

"Guys, this is from Denmark's diary." Pope says, catching our attention. "August 15th, set sail from Port-au-Prince on calm seas. Came upon the Spanish ship San Jose on fire. The entire deck was aflame. And we could hear the screams of men trapped below. The Spanish captain cared about only one thing, his valuable cargo, the Cross of Santo Domingo and countless bars of gold. Once the cargo was on board, we went to help the crew but Captain Limbrey ordered us to pull bayonets and not to let any of the Spanish crew on board. He robbed them and left them to die."

Pope reads off of his photocopy of the diary, while the rest of us watch him pace around. John B sits on the single armchair, holding a beer that I think he emptied a while ago. He hasn't said anything to me since we arrived home. I'm feeling he's a bit mad about my outburst against our father. I don't regret anything I said, though.

Kiara sits on a chair next to John B, watching Pope attentively, as if she was worried he could realize soon how traumatic everything he's reading. I don't think any of us actually has any idea of how bad the situation was for Denmark. And Pope learning about everything in just a matter of hours, days... I wonder how he's gonna cope with all of this.

I've been sitting on the couch, with JJ laying down with his head on my lap. He's playing with his lighter, one I hadn't seen in a while. It tugs a bit on my heart seeing the JJ engraved on it that I did years ago. I've been playing with his hair, focusing on the glimpses of lights JJ's ring reflects on my thumb.

Pope takes a stool from under our table, and pulls it towards him to sit down next to my brother. JJ flicks his lighter closed, and says, "So it didn't go down off Bermuda."

"And it was a Limbrey stealing shit again." Kiara scoffs, looking unimpressed by the new information we just learned.

But I just can't stop wondering... Did my father really not know about this? How could he be working with Limbrey and not know that her ancestors stole everything that was on the Merchant? It doesn't make sense. Dad knew everything. I'm sure he did.

I spent countless nights awake with him, reading old papers and diaries. There's no way he never came across this information. And still, he never said a word. To us. To Pope. Never.

And after dying, he sent us on a treasure hunt with half the information. Didn't he know Ward would take it from us? Didn't he know that he was putting us in danger? Didn't he fucking know?

I shake my head, trying to push away my thoughts, and I inhale deeply. My hand has stopped moving on JJ's head, but he hasn't said anything. I continue to play with locks of blonde hair, while looking at Pope, sitting in front of us.

"Are you okay, Pope?" He raises his head from the paper, and watches me, furrowing his eyebrows and nodding silently. "We know that learning about all this can be... difficult. It's okay if you-"