Pirate Shares: Fantasy

She went to the dock to buy shares in a pirate ship. She covered her face with a veil to keep others from seeing her, but the quality of her clothes would give her away as money--and, paradoxically when among pirates, keep her from being kidnapped or otherwise harmed. They knew what money coming to their dock meant. She knew that this money would end in the suffering and perhaps death of others, but she had no choice. Or so she kept telling herself. It was four years before she learned how right--and how wrong--she'd been. That was when the pirates whose armaments she'd helped to fund had made a crucial mistake and held a powerful witch for ransom.

Potential: Medium.
Inspiration: In Somalia, which is without a central government to speak of and where very little functions beyond an Islamic resistance and individual warlords' fiefdoms, a robust "stock market" has emerged in the city of Haradheere for "investors" in the seagoing pirate "industry," to raise money and supplies for kidnappers in exchange for a share of the bounty once a ransom is paid. According to a December Reuters dispatch, 72 "companies" are listed on the exchange, enabling "venture capital" to fund greater piracy traffic and more sophisticated looting. There even seems to be a financial "bubble" at work, in that since the "exchange" opened, pirates' ransoms have doubled to about $4 million per ship. [Reuters, 12-1-09]
Notes: I love the idea of buying shares in pirates, but this story idea isn't the right one.