Pirates of the Caribbean: The Price of Freedom

“Don’t say anything, Jack. There isn’t anything to say.”
“All right, love.”
They lay back down, not touching, and she closed her eyes,
hoping for sleep. Her heart ached, but she did not allow herself to
weep. There would be time for that later. It’s so strange, she thought.
Human nature is so strange…and so greedy. Back when I thought he
didn’t care, I would have been wild with joy if he had just held my
hand and smiled at me. Now, when I have so much more, I can’t keep
myself from wanting the impossible.…
She could tell by his breathing that he had fallen asleep.
Ayisha lay awake, staring into the darkness. Finally, Jack rolled
over and threw an arm over her. He was still asleep, but the touch
brought comfort. She relaxed, and, finally, she drifted off.
* * *
Jack stood on the bow of the Wicked Wench, with Ayisha, Tarek, and
Prince Shabako. La Vipère, as she had done for so many leagues,
was sailing in the Wench’s wake, half a mile distant.
A dark gray smudge marked the southeast horizon. It was
impossible to say just how far away it lay. It might have been two or
three leagues, or two miles, or a mile. Or less. There was something
uncanny about that smudge. It was difficult to make the eye focus on it.
If Jack hadn’t known otherwise, he might have thought the smudge was
a distant bank of very low, dark clouds. Or the last remnants of a gale,
heading off into the distance. Or perhaps even a low-lying ridge of
rock, or a dark-colored sandbar.
“You’re sure that’s Kerma?” he said, shading his eyes and
peering at it. “Looks like…a bank of cloud, or fog. Or maybe a
sandbar.”
“Yes,” all three of the Zerzurans said, at almost the same moment.
Then they looked at each other and smiled.
“Home,” Shabako added. “I never thought I would see it again.”
Jack raised his spyglass. “Jack,” Ayisha warned, “I wouldn’t do
that.”
But Jack had already looked through the eyepiece.
The spyglass magnified the smudge, making it seem quite close,