PotC Big Bang Fic: "Liberties" (3/7)
Title: "Liberties" (3/7)
Author: Luvvycat
Art: shytan
Characters/Pairings: Young Will Turner/Young Elizabeth Swann, Weatherby Swann; Elizabeth Swann Turner/Jack Sparrow (epilogue)
Rating: PG13/Soft R (at most!)
Warnings: Flashbacks to violent events in Prologue; minor sexual suggestiveness in Epilogue; everything else in-between is fairly mild.
Summary: After young Will Turner is rescued from the sea, Governor Swann (at Elizabeth’s suggestion) instals him as a servant in the Swann household. Despite their differences in station, the children find that they have much in common, and become fast friends. For two years the bond between Will and Elizabeth grows stronger, until an act of innocent impulse threatens to end that friendship and separate the pair forever. Based on my previously-posted drabbles "Skirmish", "Resurrected", and "The Gift". The J/E Epilogue is set six years after the conclusion of AWE.
A/N: Dedicated with my most profuse thanks and boundless admiration to my beta extraordinaire geekmama (whose invaluable input greatly improved this tale), and to pearlseed , whose comments to me regarding "Skirmish" inspired the Epilogue.
Previous chapters:
1. Prologue
2. Chapter 1
Chapter 2
For Elizabeth, those daily "constitutionals" became the focus of her day, particularly now that she had gained a companion for her frolics. As it turned out, Will had grown up as bereft of siblings and playmates as she had, and those precious hours of liberty-she from her lessons and daughterly duties, Will from his chores-were looked forward to, by both, with eager anticipation. Though they were never far from the watchful eye of her governess, Mistress Meriwether, often, under the influence of the mid-day sun (or perhaps overcome by ennui at the less-than-scintillating contents of her current tome), their chaperone would nod off over her book and enjoy a nap, leaving Elizabeth and Will unsupervised freedom to be the children that they were, no longer Governor's daughter and servant-boy, but merely friends and playfellows.
She enjoyed drawing Will out-staid boy that he tended to be-and found that beneath the well-mannered and humble façade lurked a quick wit and a sharp humour that could be coaxed to the fore, and she never lost an opportunity to do so.
* * * * *
"Will?"
"Hmmm?"
"What are you thinking of?"
"'M not thinking of anything just now. I'm trying to sleep ..."
She poked him in the ribs. "Please ... tell me."
He sighed, deeply. "I'm thinking that I wish you'd stop poking me, and let me sleep."
Elizabeth looked down at him, stretched out on his back on the sand, eyes closed and dark lashes fanned out upon his cheeks, his ill-fitting, cast-off tricorne tilted down over his nose. She pouted at his unresponsiveness, and, as noisily as she could, started tossing the seashells she had gathered into her basket. She counted each out, loudly, as it went in...
* * * * *
"One! ... two! ... three! ... four! ... five! ... six! ..."
Will sighed again, slitted open an eye. "What are you doing?"
"Nothing."
"It doesn't sound like nothing."
"Just counting my shells."
"Well, can't you manage to count more quietly?"
"No. Seven! ... eight! ... nine! ... ten! ..."
With a groan, Will surrendered. "All right, Elizabeth … you win." Pushing his hat up and levering himself into a sitting position, he turned a look upon her that contrived to be both annoyed and fond at the same time. If there was one thing he had learned about his friend during these past months of their acquaintance, it was that she always managed to get her way, no matter what. It was a quality he both admired and found (on occasion) quite irritating. "What was the question again?"
She set the basket aside, and turned a sunny, rather self-satisfied (and surprisingly endearing) smile at him, and his annoyance was instantly dispelled. "I asked, what were you thinking of?"
"Truly, nothing in particular," he hedged, not wanting to give rise yet again to a subject that continued to put them at odds with one another.
Her golden-brown gaze regarded him cynically. "Will, no conscious person thinks of absolutely nothing."
The expression on her face told him she wouldn't let the matter go. Better, then, to tell her the truth. "Actually, I was thinking about my father ... and perhaps continuing my search for him one day ..."
* * * * *
"Oh!" Elizabeth felt a twinge of guilt and dismay. She had hoped that he would have forgotten that quest, given it up by now. Not that she begrudged him finding his only living parent (if, indeed, his father was still alive), but she couldn't bear thinking of the danger in which Will might be putting himself.
When she had first learned of his intent to find the elder William Turner, it had briefly crossed her mind to ask her own father to use his influence and connections to help locate Will's. But then she recalled the medallion she'd found in Will's possession ... a pirate medallion which, according to Will, had come to him from his father.
The implications of the gift might have eluded Will, but not her. Why would Will's father send his son a pirate medallion, unless he, himself, was a pirate? And, though Will refused to accept the possibility (indeed, he became extremely out of sorts whenever she tried to broach the subject), Elizabeth was convinced all the more that William Turner, senior, was not the honest merchant seaman his son insisted he was. And, if that was true, then how could it benefit Will for her father to help find his, only to have those dearly-held illusions shattered? Worse, what if his pirate father, once found, was convicted of piracy and condemned to the gallows?
"A short drop, and a sudden stop ..." Lieutenant Norrington's words came back to her, hauntingly. His solution for dealing with pirates. All pirates.
And, perhaps, even the blameless sons of pirates?
The very thought made her shiver despite the afternoon warmth.
No. It would be the soul of cruelty itself, to reunite father and son, only to have the son watch his father hang ... and perhaps even hang himself. It was quite clear that the Lieutenant's view toward pirates was exceedingly narrow; in his eyes, all were deserving of the noose. What if an accident of birth proved to be sufficient grounds to condemn Will as well?
She couldn't ... wouldn't do that to Will. After all this time, after lonely years of longing for the fellowship of someone her own age, she would not have finally gained a treasured friend, only to see his life end in tragedy and death. Not if she could do something to prevent it.
So, to protect Will, she had kept her silence ... as well as the medallion, safely secured now in a hidden drawer in her bureau. Where it would remain, until she deemed it safe to reveal it (and its secrets) to Will.
She shrugged. "Will ... don't you think, if your father was still alive, that he would be searching for you? You've been here in Port Royal for the better part of a year now. Certainly, if he had a mind to find you, he would have done so by now?"
Will's face took on a stubborn mien, as it always did when they discussed this singular subject. "Elizabeth ... he's my father! My blood! If he's out there to be found, it's my responsibility-nay, my duty as a son-to do so! Or, if he's no longer alive, to discover what happened to him."
She sighed. "If you say so."
"And ..." he started, then paused.
She turned toward him, saw the guarded look on his face. "Yes?"
"Well ... if he were looking for me ... found out that I left on the Sally Mae, and that she sank, with no reported survivors ..."
"Then he may believe you dead, as well."
"Yes."
"But, Will, after all these months, surely the Royal Navy reported you saved. If he made inquiries, he would have learned that you're alive, and living here in Port Royal."
His face fell. "You're right, of course." But, knowing him to be as stubborn as she, in his own way, she knew that wouldn't stop him from searching, on his own, for news of his "sailor" father. She hoped he wouldn't be disappointed-nay, destroyed-when he eventually found out the truth.
"Will ..." she started hesitantly, and waited until his dark eyes fixed on her face before continuing, quietly, "Are you ever going to tell me what happened that day, on the Sally Mae?"
As usual when she raised the subject of that day, his face suddenly shuttered, like the hatch of a dark-lantern slamming closed. "I can't," he said, evasively. "In fact, I don't even remember much of that day myself." She knew it as a lie. One thing she had learned about Will was that he had an extraordinary memory … and that he was a very poor liar.
She also knew better than to press him when he was in such a mood. So she tried a different tack.
"Will ..." she set her basket of shells aside, "why don't we play pirates? I've brought those lovely wooden swords you made me for my birthday!"
"What? Again?" She was gratified to see his withdrawn look replaced by one of mild exasperation.
She grinned. "You know it is my favourite game, even if it isn't yours. Besides ..." she slanted him a coy, knowing look. "It's why you made them for me, isn't it? What's the sense of having them, if one can't put them to use? And, as it's a pair, and it's no fun playing pirates by one's self, you and I both know, if one sword is meant for me, then you must have intended the other to be for you ..."
He looked as though he would protest that assumption, but then a telltale blush darkened the already tanned skin of his face, and she knew she had him dead to rights.
"Very well…" he said. Rising to his feet with an exaggerated, long-suffering sigh, he dusted the white sand from the seat of his breeches, then, with a shy smile, held his hand out, brown eyes twinkling as they gazed down into hers. "As m'lady commands!" he said, in his best Sir Walter Raleigh voice.
Placing her hand in his, she gave a short, gay little laugh of victory and allowed him to help her to her feet.
* * * * *
And another year passed thusly, as they continued to grow, as children invariably do, and also grow closer, neither suspecting that their happy times together, and the beautiful friendship they had forged, could ever come to an end…
Author: Luvvycat
Art: shytan
Characters/Pairings: Young Will Turner/Young Elizabeth Swann, Weatherby Swann; Elizabeth Swann Turner/Jack Sparrow (epilogue)
Rating: PG13/Soft R (at most!)
Warnings: Flashbacks to violent events in Prologue; minor sexual suggestiveness in Epilogue; everything else in-between is fairly mild.
Summary: After young Will Turner is rescued from the sea, Governor Swann (at Elizabeth’s suggestion) instals him as a servant in the Swann household. Despite their differences in station, the children find that they have much in common, and become fast friends. For two years the bond between Will and Elizabeth grows stronger, until an act of innocent impulse threatens to end that friendship and separate the pair forever. Based on my previously-posted drabbles "Skirmish", "Resurrected", and "The Gift". The J/E Epilogue is set six years after the conclusion of AWE.
A/N: Dedicated with my most profuse thanks and boundless admiration to my beta extraordinaire geekmama (whose invaluable input greatly improved this tale), and to pearlseed , whose comments to me regarding "Skirmish" inspired the Epilogue.
Previous chapters:
1. Prologue
2. Chapter 1
Chapter 2
For Elizabeth, those daily "constitutionals" became the focus of her day, particularly now that she had gained a companion for her frolics. As it turned out, Will had grown up as bereft of siblings and playmates as she had, and those precious hours of liberty-she from her lessons and daughterly duties, Will from his chores-were looked forward to, by both, with eager anticipation. Though they were never far from the watchful eye of her governess, Mistress Meriwether, often, under the influence of the mid-day sun (or perhaps overcome by ennui at the less-than-scintillating contents of her current tome), their chaperone would nod off over her book and enjoy a nap, leaving Elizabeth and Will unsupervised freedom to be the children that they were, no longer Governor's daughter and servant-boy, but merely friends and playfellows.
She enjoyed drawing Will out-staid boy that he tended to be-and found that beneath the well-mannered and humble façade lurked a quick wit and a sharp humour that could be coaxed to the fore, and she never lost an opportunity to do so.
* * * * *
"Will?"
"Hmmm?"
"What are you thinking of?"
"'M not thinking of anything just now. I'm trying to sleep ..."
She poked him in the ribs. "Please ... tell me."
He sighed, deeply. "I'm thinking that I wish you'd stop poking me, and let me sleep."
Elizabeth looked down at him, stretched out on his back on the sand, eyes closed and dark lashes fanned out upon his cheeks, his ill-fitting, cast-off tricorne tilted down over his nose. She pouted at his unresponsiveness, and, as noisily as she could, started tossing the seashells she had gathered into her basket. She counted each out, loudly, as it went in...
* * * * *
"One! ... two! ... three! ... four! ... five! ... six! ..."
Will sighed again, slitted open an eye. "What are you doing?"
"Nothing."
"It doesn't sound like nothing."
"Just counting my shells."
"Well, can't you manage to count more quietly?"
"No. Seven! ... eight! ... nine! ... ten! ..."
With a groan, Will surrendered. "All right, Elizabeth … you win." Pushing his hat up and levering himself into a sitting position, he turned a look upon her that contrived to be both annoyed and fond at the same time. If there was one thing he had learned about his friend during these past months of their acquaintance, it was that she always managed to get her way, no matter what. It was a quality he both admired and found (on occasion) quite irritating. "What was the question again?"
She set the basket aside, and turned a sunny, rather self-satisfied (and surprisingly endearing) smile at him, and his annoyance was instantly dispelled. "I asked, what were you thinking of?"
"Truly, nothing in particular," he hedged, not wanting to give rise yet again to a subject that continued to put them at odds with one another.
Her golden-brown gaze regarded him cynically. "Will, no conscious person thinks of absolutely nothing."
The expression on her face told him she wouldn't let the matter go. Better, then, to tell her the truth. "Actually, I was thinking about my father ... and perhaps continuing my search for him one day ..."
* * * * *
"Oh!" Elizabeth felt a twinge of guilt and dismay. She had hoped that he would have forgotten that quest, given it up by now. Not that she begrudged him finding his only living parent (if, indeed, his father was still alive), but she couldn't bear thinking of the danger in which Will might be putting himself.
When she had first learned of his intent to find the elder William Turner, it had briefly crossed her mind to ask her own father to use his influence and connections to help locate Will's. But then she recalled the medallion she'd found in Will's possession ... a pirate medallion which, according to Will, had come to him from his father.
The implications of the gift might have eluded Will, but not her. Why would Will's father send his son a pirate medallion, unless he, himself, was a pirate? And, though Will refused to accept the possibility (indeed, he became extremely out of sorts whenever she tried to broach the subject), Elizabeth was convinced all the more that William Turner, senior, was not the honest merchant seaman his son insisted he was. And, if that was true, then how could it benefit Will for her father to help find his, only to have those dearly-held illusions shattered? Worse, what if his pirate father, once found, was convicted of piracy and condemned to the gallows?
"A short drop, and a sudden stop ..." Lieutenant Norrington's words came back to her, hauntingly. His solution for dealing with pirates. All pirates.
And, perhaps, even the blameless sons of pirates?
The very thought made her shiver despite the afternoon warmth.
No. It would be the soul of cruelty itself, to reunite father and son, only to have the son watch his father hang ... and perhaps even hang himself. It was quite clear that the Lieutenant's view toward pirates was exceedingly narrow; in his eyes, all were deserving of the noose. What if an accident of birth proved to be sufficient grounds to condemn Will as well?
She couldn't ... wouldn't do that to Will. After all this time, after lonely years of longing for the fellowship of someone her own age, she would not have finally gained a treasured friend, only to see his life end in tragedy and death. Not if she could do something to prevent it.
So, to protect Will, she had kept her silence ... as well as the medallion, safely secured now in a hidden drawer in her bureau. Where it would remain, until she deemed it safe to reveal it (and its secrets) to Will.
She shrugged. "Will ... don't you think, if your father was still alive, that he would be searching for you? You've been here in Port Royal for the better part of a year now. Certainly, if he had a mind to find you, he would have done so by now?"
Will's face took on a stubborn mien, as it always did when they discussed this singular subject. "Elizabeth ... he's my father! My blood! If he's out there to be found, it's my responsibility-nay, my duty as a son-to do so! Or, if he's no longer alive, to discover what happened to him."
She sighed. "If you say so."
"And ..." he started, then paused.
She turned toward him, saw the guarded look on his face. "Yes?"
"Well ... if he were looking for me ... found out that I left on the Sally Mae, and that she sank, with no reported survivors ..."
"Then he may believe you dead, as well."
"Yes."
"But, Will, after all these months, surely the Royal Navy reported you saved. If he made inquiries, he would have learned that you're alive, and living here in Port Royal."
His face fell. "You're right, of course." But, knowing him to be as stubborn as she, in his own way, she knew that wouldn't stop him from searching, on his own, for news of his "sailor" father. She hoped he wouldn't be disappointed-nay, destroyed-when he eventually found out the truth.
"Will ..." she started hesitantly, and waited until his dark eyes fixed on her face before continuing, quietly, "Are you ever going to tell me what happened that day, on the Sally Mae?"
As usual when she raised the subject of that day, his face suddenly shuttered, like the hatch of a dark-lantern slamming closed. "I can't," he said, evasively. "In fact, I don't even remember much of that day myself." She knew it as a lie. One thing she had learned about Will was that he had an extraordinary memory … and that he was a very poor liar.
She also knew better than to press him when he was in such a mood. So she tried a different tack.
"Will ..." she set her basket of shells aside, "why don't we play pirates? I've brought those lovely wooden swords you made me for my birthday!"
"What? Again?" She was gratified to see his withdrawn look replaced by one of mild exasperation.
She grinned. "You know it is my favourite game, even if it isn't yours. Besides ..." she slanted him a coy, knowing look. "It's why you made them for me, isn't it? What's the sense of having them, if one can't put them to use? And, as it's a pair, and it's no fun playing pirates by one's self, you and I both know, if one sword is meant for me, then you must have intended the other to be for you ..."
He looked as though he would protest that assumption, but then a telltale blush darkened the already tanned skin of his face, and she knew she had him dead to rights.
"Very well…" he said. Rising to his feet with an exaggerated, long-suffering sigh, he dusted the white sand from the seat of his breeches, then, with a shy smile, held his hand out, brown eyes twinkling as they gazed down into hers. "As m'lady commands!" he said, in his best Sir Walter Raleigh voice.
Placing her hand in his, she gave a short, gay little laugh of victory and allowed him to help her to her feet.
* * * * *
And another year passed thusly, as they continued to grow, as children invariably do, and also grow closer, neither suspecting that their happy times together, and the beautiful friendship they had forged, could ever come to an end…