(no subject)
Frustration warred with pleasure whenever he passed her next day. She was much warmer to him now, and though he treasured every smile sent his way, he knew it boded ill for putting his desires behind him. He didn’t have sufficient time to worry, however, because in the afternoon, the Pearl came upon a Dutch merchant ship.
James made a hesitant protest to Sparrow. “It won’t be an easy fight - she’s heavier and better-armed...”
“And slower,” said Sparrow, handing his spyglass to Mr. Gibbs, “and no doubt dumber. Stay out of the way or you’ll be shot without warning.”
Looking into his dark, unforgiving eyes, James believed him. He hovered at the outskirts of the crew, scrambling out of the way, while the ships rained cannon on each other. After a short fight, the Dutchman ran up the white flag. Cheers erupted aboard the ship as a contingent of the Pearl’s crew swung across to the prize’s decks. They were, however, soon back: it seemed that prior to their apparent surrender, the Dutch had dropped most of their men into a boat over the starboard side and lit so many fires onboard that she couldn’t be taken.
“Bloody Dutch,” Elizabeth muttered, squinting at the gray clouds of smoke rising through the air as the Pearl began to drift away. Will came barreling up to their little group at the helm, soaked with sweat and gasping for air.
“Well, that was a waste of our time.” Gratefully he accepted a flask from Gibbs and tipped some of its contents down his throat. Wiping his mouth with his sleeve, he asked, “Where’s Jack?”
Gibbs, Anamaria, Moises, and Elizabeth exchanged equally puzzled looks.
“Y’ din’t see ‘im cross back?” Gibbs asked.
Will froze in the middle of shaking his head, his eyes growing huge as he turned to regard the Dutch ship, now almost fully ablaze. Elizabeth lunged for him as he threw himself forward. “Will, no! Help me!” she snapped over her shoulder as he struggled free of her hold. James, being the closest, stepped to her side to assist her. Will writhed in their arms, straining in the direction of the burning vessel.
“Be reasonable, man,” James hissed into his ear. Will stomped on his foot and pinched Elizabeth on the arm.
Behind him, he heard Anamaria’s hushed exclamation of “She’s goin’ to blow...” a split second before the boom of the explosion sent them all flat to the deck in reflex.
James landed halfway on top of Will, who immediately went still beneath him. Seemingly ignorant of James and Elizabeth touching him, he pressed his face into his folded arms and whispered raggedly, “No, no, oh God, no...”
Feeling the boy’s body grow tense and start to convulse, James met Elizabeth’s gaze over his head. She closed her eyes, shuttering a deep, mourning pain, and laid her cheek on Will’s bent back. He thought of how she might have looked at him if that fateful morning had turned out differently, after seeing Sparrow drop at his hands, and his throat ached.
“Shameful waste, that,” said a familiar voice behind them. As one, the three of them turned their heads to see Sparrow, looking like a drowned rat and trying in vain to wring out his headscarf. He raised an eyebrow at his boggling crew. “What, you thought a little thing like a exploding sugar shipment would dare to be the end of Captain Jack Sparrow?”
Another second of shocked silence and then Gibbs’ booming guffaw rang out, breaking the mood. Sparrow was immediately deluged with enthusiastic claps on the back (or, in Marty’s case, the knee) as a second round of cheering went up.
Though Elizabeth and James were on their feet, Will hadn’t moved. Now he stood in one swift movement, his jaw clenched hard enough to set a muscle twitching near his eye. He shouldered his way through to Sparrow, who smiled expectantly at him and held out a hand. Instead of embracing him in relief, Will hit him in the face.
Sparrow staggered back with a squawk, cupping his nose in his hands. He, along with everyone else, stared as Will stomped off to their cabin.
“Is ‘t broken?” Sparrow demanded.
Elizabeth pried his fingers away. “It’s not even bleeding.”
“Think he mostly got you in th’ eye,” Gibbs added.
Gingerly touching the bruising flesh, Sparrow pouted in the direction Will had gone. “What the devil’s gotten int’ the boy?”
“You,” said Elizabeth, poking him in the chest, “are an idiot.”
“What’d I do? I didn’t do a damned thing, except not be blown into tiny bits!”
“But he thought you had,” said Anamaria.
Elizabeth folded her arms over her chest, voice softening a bit. “He thought he’d lost you, Jack.”
Slowly, Sparrow’s hands fell from his face. “Oh.” He wrinkled his nose, his eyes sheepish. “Guess that makes sense. S’ppose I oughta go apologize.”
“Or,” James interjected, clearing his throat to get their attention, “you could let him be. Let him calm down.” He was as surprised at his own words as Elizabeth looked.
Looking downright miserable, Sparrow nodded. “Reckon you’re right. I’ll give ‘im a few hours.”
Those few hours ran out around suppertime, when Will still hadn’t emerged and Sparrow decided to take him a plate. The mess was too noisy for them to hear how this reconciliation attempt panned out, but Sparrow’s return made it clear enough. The plate was empty, its contents having been relocated to Sparrow’s clothing and hair. Head down and tail tucked firmly between his legs, he glared at Elizabeth when she opened her mouth to ask a question. She pressed her lips together to quell a smile.
“A bit more time, perhaps?” she suggested delicately. Sparrow muttered some kind of imprecation under his breath and snatched her tankard of rum. Elizabeth kept quiet as he downed half of it in one gulp, her eyes dancing at James across the table.
He got to see Sparrow’s second try, since he was preparing to retire himself. Sparrow wandered past him without giving him a look, screwed up his face, and knocked tentatively on the door. When it failed to open, he heaved a long, loud sigh.
“Will,” he called, letting his head fall against the door with a thud, “you going t’ let me in any time soon? I’ll sleep on the floor ‘f you want. Just - just open the door, love.” He jumped back, startled, as the door swung open.
James could hear Will’s low hiss, although he couldn’t see his face. “If you ever, ever do anything like that again...”
“Never,” said Sparrow, steepling his fingers, the very picture of contrition. The corners of his mouth turned up hopefully. “This mean I don’t have t' sleep on the floor?”
A hand shot out to grip his shirt and yank him inside.
Despite himself, James smiled. He wandered about until he found Gibbs, Duncan, and Marty in the midst of a cutthroat card game, watching them stare each other down for an hour before he chanced to go back to the cabin. To his intense relief, nothing but silence greeted his ears.
Not long after he’d settled in, however, a throaty moan penetrated the wooden planks separating his tiny cabin from the captain’s roomy berth. James clapped the pillow over his head. They only got louder. And it seemed that Sparrow intended to spend the entirety of the night making up for his transgressions, for the noises went on far longer than James thought was healthy for any man.
“All right, that’s quite enough.”
James glanced up. Elizabeth had quietly let herself in without bothering to knock. “I’m sorry?” Suddenly he was quite glad for his wakefulness, because there were several states in which he would have preferred she not find him.
He felt the color drain from his face as she strode toward him. She was clothed only in a white shirt, which clung to her breasts and barely fell to her hips. There was a chill in their air, enough for him to be able to discern the rise of pert nipples beneath thin cotton and - indeed, there was that state he wasn’t too keen on revealing.
Elizabeth, thank God, didn’t appear to notice. Hands on her hips, she stood at the foot of his pallet and glared daggers at the wall from which the sounds were emanating. “I’m going on watch in ten minutes, it’s a still night, and I simply refuse to listen to this for the next few hours.” She poked him in the calf with her bare toes. “Want to help?”
“Errr...” He clutched the sheet about his waist as she dropped down next to him, sitting cross-legged.
He was a gentleman, damn it all, and he would. Not. Look. Not the tiniest peep.
Fortunately for his nerves, he found a distraction in her soft, off-key humming. It was to the tune of an extremely filthy ballad about lonely merpeople. “Elizabeth!”
She flashed a grin at him. “Know this one, do you? Join in whenever you like.”
“I will do no such -”
“Oh Christ - Jack - yes, there, there! Oh!”
James sat up, cautiously keeping the sheet over his lap, and launched into the chorus.
They sang at the top of their lungs, making it through three and a half verses before shouts of “All right! We get it!” from next door became loud enough to drown them out.
“Well, that takes care of that,” said James, unable to wipe the undoubtedly ridiculous expression from his face.
Elizabeth paused to consider this option, then shook her head. “We pillage, we plunder, we rifle and loot...”
She’d taught him about half the song when the repeated thumping on the wall got too insistent to ignore.
“Fine then!” Elizabeth hollered, tossing one of James’ boots at the source of the noise. “We’ll be quiet if you’ll be quiet!”
“We’ve been being quiet,” Will retorted. For some reason, this caused Elizabeth to fall across James’ lap, helpless with giggles. His own sense of euphoria quickly dissipating, he squirmed and wondered if she’d had a bit too much to drink tonight. After a few moments, Elizabeth seemed to realize that he was uncomfortable and pushed herself to her feet.
She held out her hand, face grave. “It was an honor undertaking this mission with you, Commodore.”
“The feeling is mutual.” Inwardly marveling at his nerve, he kissed the back of her hand instead of shaking it. Her skin was cool against his lips, her eyes wide and luminous in the moonlight. She bent forward a bit, nearly leaning over him. It was with great reluctance that he released her. “Good night, Miss Swann.”
Elizabeth brought the kissed hand up to finger the top button on her blouse. “Yes,” she said, voice very subdued. “Good night, James.”
His sleep was disturbed by neither sound nor dream. At breakfast she sat next to him, her thigh pressed against his own, and stole bacon from his plate. Will and Jack didn’t emerge from their cabin until well after noon, both of them unsteady on their feet. James was momentarily shocked to find himself dropping the customary surname; he supposed it had something to do with how frequently he’d heard the captain’s first name called out last night.
Late that afternoon, they dropped anchor at a small, nondescript island to refresh their water and pick up whatever food might be easily available. Gibbs and Cotton killed a couple of wild pigs during their jungle foray, so Jack declared an impromptu roast. James helped drag loose branches out to start a roaring blaze and a smaller, smokier cooking fire. The roasted pork went down as well as the rum. Watching Elizabeth laugh as she let Jack and Will pull her into a stumbling dance a few yards away, he drank more than he’d meant to. Certainly more than he should amongst such unfriendly company, but truth be told, he couldn’t call them strangers anymore, and he didn’t feel unsafe in their presence.
The only thing twisting a fearful knot in his stomach was the sway of Elizabeth’s hips. She had donned a simple shell of a dress for the occasion and she kept running her hands down her sides, as if she’d forgotten the smooth lines fostered by skirts. To lessen the stirring in his groin, he turned his head away, looking at Jack and Will instead. They were moving very slowly in one spot, arms looped around each other, Will's cheek resting on Jack's shoulder. Somebody was playing a fiddle, but he suspected it wouldn’t have made a difference to them if there had been no music. It was beautiful to behold, even if it was indecent...
No, he decided, taking another small sip. It was simply beautiful, and he could leave it at that.
He looked for Elizabeth. She had moved closer to the fire now, a bundle of sticks in one arm and a bedroll in the others.
“I’m off to make my bed elsewhere,” she said to the encampment at large. “You lot are too boisterous for my tastes.” The few who were still sensible waved her off in good spirits. She started out along the beach, following the curve of the shoreline to where it dipped behind the edge of the trees.
“Well, aren’t you going to follow?” Will dropped heavily beside him, spraying him with sand.
Jack plucked the bottle out of his hands, wriggling into his lover’s lap. “She’ll be very cross in the morning unless you snap to.”
“I suppose this is the part where you threaten me with bodily harm if I hurt her?” He gathered courage as best he could, glad that the alcohol was still warm in the pit of his stomach.
“Oh, no,” Will assured him, toying with a bead in Jack’s hair.
“Lizzie can take care of herself,” Jack confirmed. As James walked away, he could scarcely make out the hushed aside to Will: “‘Sides, he’s more likely t’ be the one with regrets.” The rum and the pearly light allowed him to disregard this.
He found Elizabeth just out of sight, the faint strains of music still audible at this distance. They didn’t speak as they worked to get a new fire started. Once the sparks caught, she laid out her blankets and he settled himself down in the sand to her right. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her lean back on her arms, looking up at the stars. For awhile, the only sounds greeting his ears were the buzz of insects, the crackle of the flames, the muffled murmur of the ocean, and Elizabeth’s even breathing.
Just as the silence began to get to him, she said in a neutral tone, “You seem much more relaxed today.”
“Do I?”
“Mmm. Didn’t bristle every time Will and Jack touched each other, for one.”
He chuckled, tugging at a loose thread on the hem of his shirt. “How did that happen? The two of them, I mean.”
“Oh, that’s quite the tale.” She blew out a long breath. “When we first came aboard, Will and I were, as you said, still engaged. In practice, we might as well have been married. Jack gave us that one spare cabin the first night, and we kept it for weeks. Everything was so new and exciting, we were finally together, and we were happy. Or so I thought.” She rocked up, locking her arms about her knees. “It’s funny, isn’t it, how easy it is to tell when someone has changed, but not so when they are still in the process of changing.”
He looked at her profile, at the scar on her collarbone, and he said, “Yes.”
“It happened gradually,” she continued, “the way they looked at each other, and how I noticed it. Will got edgy and nervous whenever he came near, and Jack wouldn’t let up teasing him, and I’d be short with them both even before I understood the reasons why. Some days it was like walking on a narrow ledge and desperately trying not to fall off. I don’t know what might have happened if we’d kept on like that. Eventually I suppose one of us would have snapped. But instead...” She paused, looking down at her interlaced fingers. “After a few months, I - I fell ill. It was nothing serious, but it did keep me abed for awhile. Will smothered me with attention and seemed to cut Jack out entirely. Jack stopped teasing him and became...very much not himself. Once I worked up the nerve to mention it, and all he did was throw a quote from Job at me. I think what he meant to emphasize was Will’s guilt - he felt that what had happened to me was a result of his feelings, that I was paying for his sins. That was when I came to the conclusion that the two of them were never going to work this out on their own, and that I would have to step in.”
“That can’t have been an easy decision to make.”
“It was, and it wasn’t. I fought the notion of giving Will up at first, until I realized that it would be more accurate to call it letting him go - and I have some first-hand experience with what that means.” She shot him a sidelong glance, lashes falling over her eyes. “So I gathered us all in Jack’s cabin, made sure it was Will having the most to drink, and...” Trailing off, she bit her lip as she smiled. “I don’t suppose you want to hear the details of that night.”
James stretched out on his side, head propped on his hand. “Not really, no.”
“Are you shocked?” she asked, her voice too strident for him to take its defiant tone at face value. “Do you think I have been irrevocably corrupted?”
“No,” he replied quietly. “Was it -” He made a loud hmph sound, amazed that he was actually following up on this topic. Even in his most erotic fantasies, he’d never considered all three together. He wasn’t entirely certain how that would be arranged. “Were they...considerate?”
The corner of Elizabeth’s mouth twitched slightly. “Yes, especially Jack, as Will was so terrified and wound up that he wasn’t good for much. Even then, it was obvious that they were...oriented to one another. I could have stayed till morning, and maybe after that, but after watching the way they slept, I knew the balance would have been off.”
“You know,” he said, “I used to think you foolish for running off with him, but now...now I believe I would call you brave.”
Elizabeth tucked her hair behind her ears before hugging her legs close. “Not always. There are days when I can’t bear the movement of the deck beneath my feet, when I long for a garden and fresh baked bread, when I feel like casting my sword into the waves. And I miss my father very much. There are good things about the life I left behind, and they haunt me in a way they don’t haunt Will, because I never had to worry about money or meals the way he did. At the same time, I know I need this so much more than he does. I -” She faltered, drew in a deep breath to compose herself.
“I spent my childhood wishing I could be somewhere else, someone else. When we came to Jamaica, I thought that was the answer. Before long I realized that all we’d really done was bring England with us, and so I grew to resent the island as much as I loved it. There was always so much out there, so much more that I knew I would never see or do or touch, while my own world had such a narrow focus. And now, with the sea open before me, I feel like I have finally stretched as far as I can, and that right here, right now, is where I want to be. In this very spot, at this precise moment - this is the horizon.” She twisted a garnet ring on her middle finger, making it catch the firelight. “Jack told me once that what the Pearl means is freedom. I thought I understood it then. I know I understand it now.”
For a long time, he did nothing but count heartbeats and watch her stare into the fire. Then she turned her head to look at him, drawing him forth without a word. He raised himself up on his arms and moved across the scant space between them, until he was near enough to catch her scent of rum and sea.
She raised her hand to his face, curving it along his jaw. “At this very moment, James,” she whispered, “what is it that you want?”
You, always you, he thought, but then that wasn’t right, because this was nothing like his suppressed desire for her in the days of their courtship. This was nothing about what she represented, and everything about who she was.
“To be free,” he said, and kissed her.
When he pulled her down to him, he felt the strength he had faced during their mock duel, coiled muscle and sinew in her long legs, the arms clutching him fiercely. Yet she was soft in all the places a woman should be soft - her breasts, the downy patch of hair below her belly, the flesh rounding beneath her backbone - and within, when he pressed between her thighs. Here she was both - soft and warm and wet, but tightening and releasing as surely as her fingers gripping his shoulders. She threw her head back when she came, the line of her throat unbroken and pale, before she crumpled against his chest. He murmured nonsense into her hair, soothing her through the lingering tremors. Her mouth descended on his to swallow his cries as his release made his hands spasm on her hips.
He suffered no further dreams after returning to the ship.
She was ruthless in her desires, often cornering him in the middle of the day. It embarrassed him to be dragged off to his cabin in full view of the crew, but he would not have refused her for all the world. Besides which, Elizabeth had always been creative about getting her way.
“Tell me, James.”
“Elizabeth -” He broke off on a groan, thrusting helplessly into her firm grip. She would not let him touch her, nor alter the twisting motions at the base of his cock. He was aching with need and he thought he’d go mad from the unending torture.
“I want to know the name of the first woman who touched you like this,” said Elizabeth pleasantly.
She flicked a thumbnail against his shaft and his hips bucked. “Ahhh - Margaret, her name was Margaret, a prostitute when I was a midshipman...” He gave in, babbling at her - anything to get her to take him fully in hand or mouth or whatever else she pleased to do, as long as she did it soon.
“Mmm,” she said with approval, giving him a close stroke. “And have you ever gone to bed with a man?”
He couldn’t believe he was saying this, but then again he couldn’t believe he was taking the governor’s daughter to his bed every night. “I - oh God - Lieutenant Teller, aboard the Chancellor. I was seventeen.” He let out a low gasp, hands fisting in the bedsheets as she leaned down to close her lips around his swollen cockhead.
“What did he do to you?” she murmured against his demanding erection daintily, licking away clear fluid.
“He - he used his mouth - please, Elizabeth!”
She drew back, tsking at his impatience and sliding her hand back to cup his heavy balls. “A moment, James. Did you return the favor?”
Evil wench - “Of course I - in the name of all that’s holy, stop tormenting me! Oh...”
“And did you enjoy it?” Back to nuzzling his length, tiny questing kisses that were nowhere near sufficient. And he’d suffered just about enough of this. Every man had a breaking point.
“Yes...” He grabbed her wrists, taking her by enough surprise to enable him to flip over and pin her down. She growled and twisted in his grasp, sinking her teeth into his neck. James was undeterred, and in any case, she quieted down as he kissed a path down her torso. “Not as much as I enjoyed learning how to make a woman want me more than her next breath.”
Sharply indrawn breath from Elizabeth, her legs falling wide, her eyes squeezing shut. Grinning wickedly, he thought about giving her a taste of her own medicine, but she was simply too enticing like this. And he loved the noises she made when he swept his tongue along her silky folds, and inside, deeper - Elizabeth whimpered his name, her hands coming up to wend painfully in his hair.
“How to make her give up all her own secrets...” he breathed against her inner thigh. With a strangled cry, Elizabeth grabbed his shoulders, drew him up, and kissed him wildly as she fastened her legs about his waist. He drove into her hard, relishing the way she met each press upwards-downwards and followed every brief withdrawal. Knowing he wouldn’t last long, he slipped his hand between their bodies to find that bit of irregular flesh just above where he sank into her. Her voice rose in a keen, sounding almost as though she was mourning the climax rippling through her. James let go and planted his hands flat for his final stabbing thrusts, staring down into her half-closed eyes.
“Elizabeth,” he rasped, throat overworked from all the times before. He tumbled down into her embrace, breathing harshly against her sweaty neck.
Slowly her arms and legs fell from him, lying still. He raised his head, confused at the distance in her eyes, fearing he’d done something wrong.
“I can’t do that, James,” she said, smoothing the wrinkles from his brow. The stars were fading from her eyes, leaving behind a wistful hurt. “I can’t give you all my secrets.”
He moved carefully off her, rolling onto his back and staring at the beams above his head. “I know,” he said, pressing his hand to his eyes.
She propped herself up on her elbow, leaning over him and drawing a figure eight around his nipples. “But here’s a secret I can tell you." Her voice was falsely bright. "If you should ever find yourself among hostiles, all you need do is take your jacket off.”
“Really?” Nibbling at her earlobe, he cupped the weight of her breast in one hand.
“Mmm-hmm,” Elizabeth said. “It’s those pristine tight breeches you wear. No one on earth could resist the form you cut in them.”
“And how, pray tell, would you know about my breeches?”
“That day I was playing down by the docks and you dove in to save Henry Watkins?” He nodded, remembering. “Well, let’s just say it was one of those moments which confirmed my burgeoning womanhood.”
“Burgeoning,” he said, drawing the syllables out on his tongue, making her giggle and press her ear to his voice box. “That is a terribly descriptive word, don’t you think?”
Elizabeth sighed in mock exasperation as she reached down to help coax him back to hardness. “That damn Navy training of yours - always at the ready.”
They spoke lightly for the rest of the night, when they could manage words at all. The next day, Jack announced that they were coming up on Port Royal.
If had been a month. James could mark the time by the shade of his skin, the length of his hair (he had been allowed a shaving razor every morning, although he had been closely monitored). A mere thirty days, give or take a few. The man who had been taken aboard those thirty days ago might have been considered a close relative, a brother or a cousin, whose blood he shared but from whom he had grown distant. Remembering what Elizabeth had said about watching someone change, he decided it was nearly as imperceptible in the self.
She came to him as he was bundling his spare clothing together. Closing the door, she leaned against it and regarded him with somber brown eyes.
“I thought a private goodbye would be welcome,” she said.
Something twisted then, deep in his gut. He crossed the tiny room in a few strides, reached out to take her hand. “Elizabeth...”
“James.” She smiled at him, her expression wobbling a bit.
“Come with me,” he burst out, spurred by her vulnerability. “I’ll keep you safe, we’ll think of something - you’ll be able to see your father again, your home -”
Elizabeth was slowly shaking her head, a disagreeable line forming between her brows. “James, have you been looking at me all this time? Listening to me?”
“Well, of course,” he said, squeezing her hand, “that’s why I -”
“No,” said Elizabeth, quiet but steady. “I’ve made my choices.”
“It doesn’t mean you can’t change -”
“I don’t want to change,” she said with sudden vehemence, pulling her hand away. “What did you think, precisely - that all it would take for me to eat out of your hand was a good fuck?”
He colored at her words, took a step back from her harsh tone. “I didn’t mean...”
“You’ve no idea what you are asking. Tell me something - if I returned with you to Port Royal, you’d want marriage, a home, children, am I correct?”
The way she spat those things out was so derogatory that he flinched.
“Well?”
His temper flared. “Yes,” he snapped. “Yes, I would. Is that so wrong?”
“Perhaps not for you, but that is not what I want. Besides which,” she added, lifting her chin in that proud way of hers, “I can’t.”
“Please believe me, I would never force you to -”
“I can’t, you imbecile.”
Ill, she’d said - and realizing what that must have meant, he finished weakly. “Oh.”
“Look, James,” she said, her face softening, though not enough for hope. “This was - it was pleasant, but we only harm ourselves by making it more than it was. I -” She dropped her gaze to her feet. “I will miss you. But I can’t be what you need.”
His throat worked dryly before he could speak. “Right. Well, then.” He stepped forward to kiss her cheek, feeling unsure of his own limbs. Beneath his lips, he could feel the muscles of her jaw tightening.
“Shouldn’t be too difficult rowing in,” said Jack, lowering a large flask of water into the ship’s smallest boat. James nodded mechanically, unable to keep himself from seeking out Elizabeth. She was standing aft, her head bent in a private conversation with Will. He noticed James’ gaze and raised his hand in farewell. Elizabeth turned her face to the sun.
He knew the blow was evident in his eyes, but Jack didn’t comment. In shaking James’ hand, he brought them both back to their first meeting, and they shared a rueful smile.
“It’s been interesting havin’ you aboard, Commodore.”
“It was interesting being aboard, Captain Sparrow.” Jack’s eyes flickered in Elizabeth’s direction. James kept his face stoically forward.
“P’raps we’ll meet again, but forgive me if ‘m not exactly holding me breath,” said Jack with a grin.
No, James thought, for he wasn’t sure he could survive this again. In all honesty, he wasn’t sure how he would survive it now.
As he rowed, he saw Elizabeth’s eyes, the sunlight in her hair, her legs tangled up in a white sheet. He heard her merry laughter, the way she whispered his name while she was in his arms, her whoops whenever she won a bet or a fencing match.
The Pearl began to slowly drift away, sinking out of sight around the cove as he came to Gallows Point at its mouth. He halted, letting his oars trail in the water as he stared up at the familiar bodies rotting away.
Then he started rowing again.
The sun was sinking to the horizon and his arms were rubbery with exhaustion by the time he caught up. Anamaria poked her head over the stern at his shout, tossing him a rope.
“Captain’s that-a-way,” she told him with a crisp nod.
“Thank you,” he said, touching his brow. That earned him a derisive snort, though he could have sworn her eyes brightened a bit.
He found Jack and Will, as she’d said, clustered at the door to the great cabin.
“Elizabeth, darling -”
“Go away!”
“Lizzie, we only -” Jack fell silent as James approached.
“Perhaps you might let me try?”
Mouth hanging open, Will nodded. Jack helpfully reached up to snap his jaws shut as he tugged the boy out of the way.
James began to knock, at a steady beat and without ceasing. He had counted to twenty-three before the door was nearly wrenched off its hinges.
“If you two don’t bugger off this instant, so help me God, I’ll - James.” She stared, her knuckles whitening on the door handle.
“Indeed,” he said, clasping his hands behind his back, as fully at attention as ever he’d been in the past.
Elizabeth tilted her head like she was listening to someone speak an incomprehensible tongue. “What are you doing? You’re supposed to be making for the town.”
“And yet here I am, standing in front of you.”
She planted balled fists on her hips, eyes storming. “Think you’re going to take me back by force, do you? Well, I never -”
“No,” said James politely. “In fact, I was thinking I might stay. If the captain has no objection, of course.”
As he’d suspected, neither man had gone far. “I believe we might be able t’ squeeze you in,” said Jack, stroking his chin thoughtfully.
“If we must,” Will agreed, embracing Jack from behind. His eyes twinkled at Elizabeth’s flabbergasted expression. “Move this, rearrange that, turn that all the way about...”
She gave them a look that would have melted glass before regarding James with suspicion. “What I said before - none of that changes, any of it.”
“I understand,” he replied.
Elizabeth swallowed hard. “Why?” she asked, her voice barely audible.
“Perhaps it was you who needed to be listening,” said James, fitting his hands to her waist. She allowed him to draw her close, although her posture was still standoffish. “Or maybe I wasn’t clear enough. What I want, in this very spot, at this very moment...” He kissed the tip of her freckled nose, smiling at the way her lashes fluttered faintly. “...is you.”
A shudder ran through her. She closed her eyes, looking as though she feared opening them and finding a different sight. “And the rest of it?”
“Doesn’t matter. I would not be here if it did.”
Finally the uncertainty eased into a smile stretching across her face. She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him lustily, drawing a round of enthusiastic clapping from their small audience. James drew himself out of the kiss little by little, ending with tiny pecks on her lips.
“Perhaps,” he said, “not in this very exact spot.”
“How does...” She glanced behind her. “...three feet south sound?”
He backed her into the cabin, nuzzling beneath her ear. “Perfect.”
As the door slammed shut, Will and Jack blinked at it.
“That’s our cabin,” the boy remarked.
“Aye,” said the captain. He tilted his head, pondering, then said, “How about the crow’s nest?”