Our Wandering Kind: From the Wreckage of Another Life
Title: Our Wandering Kind (year two): From the Wreckage of Another Life
Author: artemismuse
Pairing: Norribeth, but still only in Liz's dreams
Rating: PG
Warnings: Spoilers through AWE (which sounds strange for a pre-COTBP fic, but consider yourselves warned)
Status: WIP, 2/5-ish
Summary: James learns to sew, Elizabeth learns to carve, and they find a flaming pirate ship and a boy with a medallion...
(also, givemethechild, i'll be in need of your pirate dictionary/beta skills on part 3)
When she is thirteen, the pirates come.
First, James begins to teach Elizabeth how to carve. He makes her promise to be careful, so she won't cut herself. He tells her that most sailors do it now and then to pass the time, knowing how badly she wants to sail.
"When I can do it well enough," she says, "I'm going to carve the Dauntless and give it to you."
She insists that in return, she will teach him how to sew. He is charmed by her desire to give something back to him, so he keeps quiet and does not say that he already knows how to mend clothes and sails with needle and thread. He has a vague notion of making her a doll in a Navy uniform. He wonders if she is too old for dolls.
They are a curious sight, the two of them: sitting side by side, the young officer and the Governor's daughter, him sewing and her carving wood. She adapts quickly to the task; James only has to pull the occasional splinter from Elizabeth's finger. Far more frequent are the times when Elizabeth insists on kissing his fingers all better once he has muffled a curse, pricking his finger with the needle again.
James discovers how different delicate sewing is from the making-do style he has used up till now. It is a great deal more difficult when one hopes that the thing one makes is lovely to look on as an end result. James regales his family with tales of learning to sew again, and he wishes Amelia a happy birthday from afar in his letters. She reassures him that Elizabeth is not too old for dolls, and she teases that she is envious of all the time he spends on his 'new little sister'. While corresponding with his sister, it occurs to James to draw Governor Swann aside one afternoon and inquire as to when Elizabeth's birthday is. Upon learning it is close at hand, he works feverishly into the night, swearing a blue streak every time he hurts his hands since he does not have to watch his language in front of Elizabeth.
When her birthday arrives, James finds Elizabeth has snuck onto the Dauntless once again.
"You're early. It isn't Friday yet, and your birthday isn't until the day after that."
"I know, but I didn't want to wait. I have something to give you."
"Me? But it isn't my birthday."
"That doesn't matter," she says, and produces a newspaper-wrapped lump from behind her back. "Here." She shifts back and forth restlessly, waiting for him to open it.
"The Dauntless," James exclaims. It is good work for a small girl, and a fair rendering of the ship. She has painted its name on the side. Elizabeth beams at him.
"I told you I'd give it to you. As a thank you. For teaching me."
"I'm touched," he says. "I promise to keep it in a safe place where I can admire it as much as I like. As for you… I made you something too, but you have to find it first." Her eyes light up, sensing an adventure. He hands her a set of directions he has written out for her, along with a compass. He got the idea from a game he and his siblings would play when they were younger. He hopes Elizabeth likes it. He gets his answer about ten minutes later when, with a high pitched squeal, she hurtles toward him and hugs him.
"James! He's beautiful! And he has a Lieutenant's uniform, just like you. I love him so much! Thank you. I'll sleep with him every night." Until I can exchange you for the doll, and have you to hold instead, she adds silently, more firm in her resolve than ever to marry James Norrington. All she has to do, she thinks, is get him to stop seeing her as a child or a sister substitute, and look at her as a woman. Having no mother to advise her in these matters, Elizabeth is obliged to turn to her maid, Estrella, who thinks it prudent that she wait until her figure is fully formed so as to better attract the Lieutenant's attention. She looks down at herself and amends, well, perhaps in a year or so…
Elizabeth confides to James that she finds pirates infinitely interesting, rather more interesting than the stuffy British naval officers, at any rate. She thinks it would be terribly exciting to be a pirate. James does his best to dissuade her of the notion.
"Pirates don't bathe. They're awfully smelly. They rarely have teeth, and they have all sorts of diseases."
"Yes, but they get to wear eye patches and wooden peg-legs and parrots on their shoulders."
"They have no scruples, and no loyalty, even to each other. They're all obnoxious liars, cheats and thieves. They never fight fair and they always carry pistols because none of them could best a Navy man sword-to-sword."
"Yes, but they sail the seven seas, doing as they like, living by no man's rules…" Her lower lip quivers. He is trodding all over her romantic ideas of piracy. He pays very little notice.
"Actually, that's not true either. There is such a thing as the 'Pirate's Code', and any self-respecting pirate adheres to it." Elizabeth's eyes grow wide with interest.
"What's in the Pirate's Code?"
"Oh, it's a lot of cowardly rot and nonsense about rum, tavern wenches, and abandoning your shipmates," he says flippantly. "And parlay, which you'll never need to know about because you'll never get kidnapped by pirates, but which says that any prisoner has the right to request a negotiation, or parlay, with the ship's captain and cannot be injured under its invocation."
"What would happen to you if you didn't invoke parlay?" He looks at her darkly.
"Let's hope you never have to find out. Anyway, getting to wear flamboyant clothing wouldn't be worth being hung when the Navy caught up to you, and we always do. Do you know what the East India Trading Company does to pirates?" Elizabeth shakes her head.
"They brand them."
After much debate, James is forced to concede that pirates have the best songs, and Elizabeth is forced to concede that James has much prettier hair than pirates.
It is a foggy Friday morning when James is alerted to the presence of the pirate ship. Elizabeth is standing at the ship's stern, hands clasped together as if she is singing a hymn.
"Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me."
He hears her clear high voice and shakes his head. It takes a disturbed child to come up with these notions. He is standing behind her, arms clasped behind his back, trying to decide whether to laugh or be dismayed, when he hears the cry go up: "Pirates!" Through the fog, all he can see is the black flag with the white skull-and-crossbones flapping in the breeze. He smells the smoke before they see the flames. The pirate ship is burning, as it appears it has been doing for quite some time before the Dauntless came upon it.
"I don't think they're going to be dangerous to us," the captain says. "I don't hear anything." The wind blows the other way, and then they hear it: the feeble cry of a drowning man. The crew is quick to haul him out of the water, but the only survivor of the wreck is already dying when he whispers what happened to his vessel.
"The Black Pearl. Ghost ship. Came alongside us, run by a crew of the damned… killed everyone… then set the ship on fire… fastest ship I've ever seen… cursed." With that, the man breathes his last. James is having a difficult time trying to keep Elizabeth from witnessing the death while attending to his other duties as an officer, but he has little time for reflection when he hears someone shouting.
"Sir, out in the water! Look!"
When James sees the boy floating unconscious on driftwood as the burning wreck of the pirate ship sinks behind them, he has what can only be called a premonition. He is not more than usually superstitious for a sailor, and he cannot explain how he knows with such certainty, but he knows beyond a doubt that if the boy remains, he will doom them all.
James sees Port Royal in flames, hears the screams, sees Governor Swann injured or dead, sees row upon row of innocents hanged, sees a great monster out of the deep rise up and consume ships whole, sees himself in ruin, a broken man… he sees his own death aboard a pirate vessel, run through by something out of a nightmare… he sees Elizabeth as a young woman kidnapped by and turned into a pirate, he sees her turning away from him, embracing and kissing the boy on the driftwood and hears her murmur "Will, I love you"… and oddly enough, it is this that breaks his heart, even more than the terrors on the high seas or his own demise. He cannot imagine why, since he is not ready to admit yet that a future without Elizabeth in it is no future at all. Nonetheless, he knows what he must do. He has seen a vision of the future… or a future, at any rate, one that must never be allowed to come to pass.
They rescue the boy, and James is quick to suggest a solution for the boy's future: an apprenticeship to a blacksmith in a faraway locale, a fresh start.
"Get him out of Port Royal. We don't want any… incidents… with Will."
"Sir?"
"His name. His name is Will." The crew does not question how James knows this, since the boy is still unconscious and surely was never capable of giving his name. The intensity in James's eyes silences them. Elizabeth has something in her hand, he notices- she thinks the boy is a pirate, no doubt, and is stealing away the evidence.
"Stay away from him," James commands. He has never felt more strongly about anything in his life. Whoever said children were simple was an imbecile- she can tell how badly he is shaken, and she runs to him and holds onto him and refuses to let go. He makes her give back the medallion.
"But it's pirates' booty."
"Yes, and it's probably cursed. We know what happens to people who hang on to cursed pirate treasure, don't we?"
"They get cursed," she says, very quiet.
"That's right. And you want to make some naval officer very happy someday, not be cursed, isn't that right?" She nods.
"I want to make you happy," she says sweetly, dropping the medallion into his outstretched hand.
"Yes, well, I doubt you'll still feel that way when you're older," he tells her. Merciful heavens, he thinks as he places the gold chain back around the boy's neck, that girl will be the death of me. Then he shudders, wondering if- in that strange and horrifying future- it was true.
In later years, Elizabeth will ask him why he seemed so upset that day.
He will reply, "I didn't want to lose you."
Author: artemismuse
Pairing: Norribeth, but still only in Liz's dreams
Rating: PG
Warnings: Spoilers through AWE (which sounds strange for a pre-COTBP fic, but consider yourselves warned)
Status: WIP, 2/5-ish
Summary: James learns to sew, Elizabeth learns to carve, and they find a flaming pirate ship and a boy with a medallion...
(also, givemethechild, i'll be in need of your pirate dictionary/beta skills on part 3)
When she is thirteen, the pirates come.
First, James begins to teach Elizabeth how to carve. He makes her promise to be careful, so she won't cut herself. He tells her that most sailors do it now and then to pass the time, knowing how badly she wants to sail.
"When I can do it well enough," she says, "I'm going to carve the Dauntless and give it to you."
She insists that in return, she will teach him how to sew. He is charmed by her desire to give something back to him, so he keeps quiet and does not say that he already knows how to mend clothes and sails with needle and thread. He has a vague notion of making her a doll in a Navy uniform. He wonders if she is too old for dolls.
They are a curious sight, the two of them: sitting side by side, the young officer and the Governor's daughter, him sewing and her carving wood. She adapts quickly to the task; James only has to pull the occasional splinter from Elizabeth's finger. Far more frequent are the times when Elizabeth insists on kissing his fingers all better once he has muffled a curse, pricking his finger with the needle again.
James discovers how different delicate sewing is from the making-do style he has used up till now. It is a great deal more difficult when one hopes that the thing one makes is lovely to look on as an end result. James regales his family with tales of learning to sew again, and he wishes Amelia a happy birthday from afar in his letters. She reassures him that Elizabeth is not too old for dolls, and she teases that she is envious of all the time he spends on his 'new little sister'. While corresponding with his sister, it occurs to James to draw Governor Swann aside one afternoon and inquire as to when Elizabeth's birthday is. Upon learning it is close at hand, he works feverishly into the night, swearing a blue streak every time he hurts his hands since he does not have to watch his language in front of Elizabeth.
When her birthday arrives, James finds Elizabeth has snuck onto the Dauntless once again.
"You're early. It isn't Friday yet, and your birthday isn't until the day after that."
"I know, but I didn't want to wait. I have something to give you."
"Me? But it isn't my birthday."
"That doesn't matter," she says, and produces a newspaper-wrapped lump from behind her back. "Here." She shifts back and forth restlessly, waiting for him to open it.
"The Dauntless," James exclaims. It is good work for a small girl, and a fair rendering of the ship. She has painted its name on the side. Elizabeth beams at him.
"I told you I'd give it to you. As a thank you. For teaching me."
"I'm touched," he says. "I promise to keep it in a safe place where I can admire it as much as I like. As for you… I made you something too, but you have to find it first." Her eyes light up, sensing an adventure. He hands her a set of directions he has written out for her, along with a compass. He got the idea from a game he and his siblings would play when they were younger. He hopes Elizabeth likes it. He gets his answer about ten minutes later when, with a high pitched squeal, she hurtles toward him and hugs him.
"James! He's beautiful! And he has a Lieutenant's uniform, just like you. I love him so much! Thank you. I'll sleep with him every night." Until I can exchange you for the doll, and have you to hold instead, she adds silently, more firm in her resolve than ever to marry James Norrington. All she has to do, she thinks, is get him to stop seeing her as a child or a sister substitute, and look at her as a woman. Having no mother to advise her in these matters, Elizabeth is obliged to turn to her maid, Estrella, who thinks it prudent that she wait until her figure is fully formed so as to better attract the Lieutenant's attention. She looks down at herself and amends, well, perhaps in a year or so…
Elizabeth confides to James that she finds pirates infinitely interesting, rather more interesting than the stuffy British naval officers, at any rate. She thinks it would be terribly exciting to be a pirate. James does his best to dissuade her of the notion.
"Pirates don't bathe. They're awfully smelly. They rarely have teeth, and they have all sorts of diseases."
"Yes, but they get to wear eye patches and wooden peg-legs and parrots on their shoulders."
"They have no scruples, and no loyalty, even to each other. They're all obnoxious liars, cheats and thieves. They never fight fair and they always carry pistols because none of them could best a Navy man sword-to-sword."
"Yes, but they sail the seven seas, doing as they like, living by no man's rules…" Her lower lip quivers. He is trodding all over her romantic ideas of piracy. He pays very little notice.
"Actually, that's not true either. There is such a thing as the 'Pirate's Code', and any self-respecting pirate adheres to it." Elizabeth's eyes grow wide with interest.
"What's in the Pirate's Code?"
"Oh, it's a lot of cowardly rot and nonsense about rum, tavern wenches, and abandoning your shipmates," he says flippantly. "And parlay, which you'll never need to know about because you'll never get kidnapped by pirates, but which says that any prisoner has the right to request a negotiation, or parlay, with the ship's captain and cannot be injured under its invocation."
"What would happen to you if you didn't invoke parlay?" He looks at her darkly.
"Let's hope you never have to find out. Anyway, getting to wear flamboyant clothing wouldn't be worth being hung when the Navy caught up to you, and we always do. Do you know what the East India Trading Company does to pirates?" Elizabeth shakes her head.
"They brand them."
After much debate, James is forced to concede that pirates have the best songs, and Elizabeth is forced to concede that James has much prettier hair than pirates.
It is a foggy Friday morning when James is alerted to the presence of the pirate ship. Elizabeth is standing at the ship's stern, hands clasped together as if she is singing a hymn.
"Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me."
He hears her clear high voice and shakes his head. It takes a disturbed child to come up with these notions. He is standing behind her, arms clasped behind his back, trying to decide whether to laugh or be dismayed, when he hears the cry go up: "Pirates!" Through the fog, all he can see is the black flag with the white skull-and-crossbones flapping in the breeze. He smells the smoke before they see the flames. The pirate ship is burning, as it appears it has been doing for quite some time before the Dauntless came upon it.
"I don't think they're going to be dangerous to us," the captain says. "I don't hear anything." The wind blows the other way, and then they hear it: the feeble cry of a drowning man. The crew is quick to haul him out of the water, but the only survivor of the wreck is already dying when he whispers what happened to his vessel.
"The Black Pearl. Ghost ship. Came alongside us, run by a crew of the damned… killed everyone… then set the ship on fire… fastest ship I've ever seen… cursed." With that, the man breathes his last. James is having a difficult time trying to keep Elizabeth from witnessing the death while attending to his other duties as an officer, but he has little time for reflection when he hears someone shouting.
"Sir, out in the water! Look!"
When James sees the boy floating unconscious on driftwood as the burning wreck of the pirate ship sinks behind them, he has what can only be called a premonition. He is not more than usually superstitious for a sailor, and he cannot explain how he knows with such certainty, but he knows beyond a doubt that if the boy remains, he will doom them all.
James sees Port Royal in flames, hears the screams, sees Governor Swann injured or dead, sees row upon row of innocents hanged, sees a great monster out of the deep rise up and consume ships whole, sees himself in ruin, a broken man… he sees his own death aboard a pirate vessel, run through by something out of a nightmare… he sees Elizabeth as a young woman kidnapped by and turned into a pirate, he sees her turning away from him, embracing and kissing the boy on the driftwood and hears her murmur "Will, I love you"… and oddly enough, it is this that breaks his heart, even more than the terrors on the high seas or his own demise. He cannot imagine why, since he is not ready to admit yet that a future without Elizabeth in it is no future at all. Nonetheless, he knows what he must do. He has seen a vision of the future… or a future, at any rate, one that must never be allowed to come to pass.
They rescue the boy, and James is quick to suggest a solution for the boy's future: an apprenticeship to a blacksmith in a faraway locale, a fresh start.
"Get him out of Port Royal. We don't want any… incidents… with Will."
"Sir?"
"His name. His name is Will." The crew does not question how James knows this, since the boy is still unconscious and surely was never capable of giving his name. The intensity in James's eyes silences them. Elizabeth has something in her hand, he notices- she thinks the boy is a pirate, no doubt, and is stealing away the evidence.
"Stay away from him," James commands. He has never felt more strongly about anything in his life. Whoever said children were simple was an imbecile- she can tell how badly he is shaken, and she runs to him and holds onto him and refuses to let go. He makes her give back the medallion.
"But it's pirates' booty."
"Yes, and it's probably cursed. We know what happens to people who hang on to cursed pirate treasure, don't we?"
"They get cursed," she says, very quiet.
"That's right. And you want to make some naval officer very happy someday, not be cursed, isn't that right?" She nods.
"I want to make you happy," she says sweetly, dropping the medallion into his outstretched hand.
"Yes, well, I doubt you'll still feel that way when you're older," he tells her. Merciful heavens, he thinks as he places the gold chain back around the boy's neck, that girl will be the death of me. Then he shudders, wondering if- in that strange and horrifying future- it was true.
In later years, Elizabeth will ask him why he seemed so upset that day.
He will reply, "I didn't want to lose you."