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Author: Guede Mazaka
Rating: PG-13. Some groping.
Pairing: Will/Groves, some Horatio/Archie.
Feedback: Typos, character discussions, etc.
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Notes: Crossover with Horatio Hornblower. Pretend the first four HH movies happened, only adapted to the time of PotC. Written prior to the second PotC film. Inspired by a Japanese folktale.
Summary: Will recounts a stormy adventure.
***
Port Royal was now a town of light and good cheer, with pleasant-faced people bustling in the airy, broad streets. The houses lining the roads were mostly in good repair, built of solid construction and diligently kept up so shutters hung straight and window-glass gleamed nearly as brightly as did the buttons on Horatio and Archie’s dress uniforms. Thick vines seemed to coat every other wall with masses of brilliant, fragrant blooms.
“A sight prettier than London. At least you can breathe here without doubling over from the smell of the sewers.” Once they’d gotten into port, the sunny atmosphere had quickly dispelled the gloom engendered by Captain Groves’ little story and even done some good towards making Archie believe things really would be different here.
The captain had originally planned to show them up to Norrington’s office in the garrison himself, but upon their arrival, a courier had brought news that Norrington had rushed out early that morning and wasn’t due back till late in the evening. Apparently he’d received a tip concerning a possible attack on some heavily-laden merchant ships; the message had also carried orders for Groves to head out immediately to support Norrington. Therefore he had dropped Horatio and Archie on the docks with hasty directions and little more than a by-your-leave. Which of course was his prerogative, but nevertheless his behavior seemed unnecessarily cold.
“It’s not what I’d expected from all the stories,” Horatio replied. He stopped walking and squinted at the scrap of paper Groves had thrust at them just as a cart rumbled towards them.
“Horatio!” Archie seized Horatio’s arm barely in time and yanked him clear. They stumbled into the doorway of a small church, while the carter, after discerning they were all right, favored them with a few choice words.
In response, Horatio offered round a weak grin. “Sorry.”
The carter might be swayed by that, but Archie had seen it too many times to fall victim to it. He pushed open the door and ushered them into the church where the worst Horatio could do was fall over a pew. “Stories. I hope you’re not still thinking about Groves’ ridiculous tale. Every town has their little ghost story, and not a one of them is true.”
“Are you calling one of our commanding officers a liar, Mr. Kennedy?” Horatio set his baggage in one corner and held his paper up to the light coming through one window, but that little piece wasn’t enough to hide his quirked lips.
“Of course not. Groves was very careful not to say whether he fell on the side of lie or truth, after all,” Archie muttered. He leaned against the window-sill.
A shadow detached itself from a narrow corridor and laughed, startling Archie off the sill and Horatio into laying a hand on his sword-hilt. But it held up its hands and came promptly into the light to reveal a lean man of medium height, very near their age, with a handsome and open face. He was dressed as a workman and carried a bag of tools, but his speech hinted at some kind of education. “Will Turner, the blacksmith. Sorry, but I couldn’t help overhearing. Were you talking about Groves?”
“Turner?” That had been the name of the man in Groves’ story. A chill passed down Archie’s spine, but he quickly shook it off: that man was dead, and this one was clearly alive.
“Oh, we were told to find you if we needed help.” Horatio put away his paper and extended a hand, which Will gave a good shake. He had also made the connection and it made him nervous, shying away from looking directly at Will. “Lieutenants Horatio Hornblower and Archie Kennedy. We’re…ah…having trouble finding…our lodgings. And Commodore Norrington’s house.”
Will rocked back on the heels of his feet and looked them over carefully, as if studying the lay of an unknown stretch of sea. Then he smiled crookedly and nodded. “Groves told you the story about Dead Man’s Inn. Damn him, but he has the worst sense of humor.”
Archie almost did a jig but for the sake of his dignity, he restrained himself to a smug smile. “One for tall tales, is he?”
For some reason, that made Will laugh again. This time it had a darker twist to it. “Come on. You two look like you could use a drink and a meal first, and then I’ll show you round. As for Theodore, I’ve known him for ages. I could tell you a tale…”
* * *
The howling wind nearly lost Theodore his life, for it billowed into his coat and flung him bodily into a tree trunk. Will pulled him off it a bare heartbeat before the tree-top cracked under the hurricane’s force and came crashing to the ground. That same gust capriciously sent the two men toppling into the mud where the rain relentlessly beat them as they struggled to free themselves from the muck.
“There’s an old church down the path!” Will shouted. If it was still standing, it’d be their best hope for shelter. If they could get to their feet and straggle the remaining few hundred yards.
He dug his elbows into the ground and pushed up with all his strength. The mud was like molasses and didn’t want to release him, but he fought it and clawed at half-sunk tree roots till he’d made it onto his hands and knees. Just as he was about to stand, Theodore shoved him over again.
“Are you—”
Schnick. Silver flashed out and instinct froze Will. Then another screaming wind tumbled them over, nearly putting Will on top of a freshly-beheaded snake. Its jaws were still open and its red, red tongue flicked madly about, half-mesmerizing Will.
A crack of thunder brought him to his senses. He scrambled to his feet and pulled at Theodore’s shoulder, and together they just made it to the church before the real brunt of the storm reached them.
Thankfully, the church’s foundations and structure still seemed sound; the wood rafters creaked alarmingly, but Will could see no worrying sway. He slumped against the door and noisily blew out his breath, taking stock of the situation. His hat was gone and his sodden clothes thoroughly worked over with mud, but he still had his sword. If there was any sort of pot in the place, they could pull up some planks and have a fire, but he’d lost what little provisions he’d had with him so there’d be no dinner.
Beside him Theodore looked little better. He still clutched his sword, which he’d had to employ as a kind of walking stick for the last yards, but the scabbard and his wig were long since gone and half the facings from his coat had been ripped clean off. The other half were so shredded that they might as well have suffered the same fate. His laces were wrenched awry and his shirt was pulled out of his trousers so its drenched folds hung almost to his knees.
Will closed his eyes. “Great idea.”
“It would have been if the stream hadn’t been so swollen,” Theodore muttered. He raised a shaking hand to scrape at the mud on his face. “You can’t actually believe we would have done better to go the other way. There were too many pirates!”
“Yes, and if you’d listened longer I would have told you I knew a few. We might have been able to bluff our way through, but no, you Navy types—what?”
“You—” Theodore shook his sword the way a scolding mother did her finger “—have been spending entirely too much time with Sparrow. You even sound like him.”
Navy or not, Will was sorely tempted to demonstrate to the other man that one didn’t need a sword to make a forceful point. But then he looked at the storm raging outside and saw the ridiculousness of the whole argument. “Seems to be the preferred taste of the Navy these days, so you can’t really blame me. Come on.”
“What about your fath—” Theodore began hotly, but he caught himself almost before Will turned around. He had the grace to look meekly shamed. “Sorry, Will.”
“Theodore, I’m wet and tired and I never figured you for wavy hair.” Will nodded at the short kinky strands sticking to Theodore’s face and hid a grin at the other man’s dumbfounded face. “I think we’ve got more important matters to talk about than Norrington and Sparrow. And we are definitely not mentioning my father and Norrington in the same sentence.”
Theodore shut his gaping mouth with an audible click and vigorously nodded, a speculative glint slowly dawning in his eye. When Will turned and resumed his progress down the aisle, it took a moment for the other man to follow. Good. Between the hurricane, his last conversation with Elizabeth and the reappearance of his father, Will had plenty of serious thinking to avoid and he wanted to start at once.
Considering that, it wasn’t a surprise that he didn’t notice her till he had almost stepped on the hem of her dress. “Oh, Chr—I mean, I’m very sorry, ma’am. I—we’re refugees from the storm and we didn’t realize there was anyone else here.”
She was on her knees before the altar—it appeared to be an old Spanish Catholic church—and had her cloak drawn over her head to form a hood. Her sleeves and skirts were also long, so not an inch of her could be seen. But she did turn her head in their direction; Will had the impression of a cold, cold gaze that made his hands reflexively curl to his sword. She, however, seemed to dismiss him and instead nodded at Theodore. “I am praying for my dead husband, but this church is free to all. You may stay until the rain ceases.”
“Thank you, Will warily said. He gingerly walked round her and poked into an alcove, where he found nothing resembling a pot, but did uncover some folded cloths. The church didn’t look as if it’d been all that prosperous to begin with and it’d long since been stripped of its goods, with only a few brass candlesticks and what looked like the workaday altar coverings.
He looked at the woman again, but she’d gone back to praying and either didn’t notice or didn’t care that he was…temporarily borrowing sacramental cloths. Something about her rang wrong: the line of her back occasionally shifted in a way he didn’t think was quite human, and her voice had had a strange whispery undertone to it that he didn’t like. But with the storm outside there was hardly anything he could do about it.
Theodore had made his thanks to the woman as well and promptly forgotten about her, striding about in search of a place where the drafts didn’t blow so strongly. He caught Will’s eye and waved him over to a corner near the back of the church, well enough away from the woman so that she wouldn’t be able to see what they were doing unless she got up. “This looks well enough.”
“I found something we can use for a blanket, but it’ll be damp. No place for a fire…” Will blinked.
The other man shrugged innocently and finished stripping off his coat and shirt. He pulled at his boots till they came off with a sucking pop, then tipped them so the water ran out. Beneath the pompous uniform was actually quite a nice body, with flat, well-defined muscles that were streaked over with mud. Theodore had small, girlish-pink nipples that occasionally beaded water and dripped on the floor. “It’s warm enough to do without. We can hang them over the pews to dry,” he said, grinning up at Will.
Another glance at the woman up front showed that she wasn’t paying the least attention. Well, whatever was wrong with her apparently was going to wait. And Theodore did have a point. About the clothes.
Oh, damn it. Or as Jack would have said—should’ve been getting on with it near five minutes ago. Will propped his sword up against the wall by Theodore’s and pulled his shirt over his head, then spread it over the back of the nearest pew. He shivered as a lone finger traced up his back. “Can’t you wait till we get to the floor? There’s her. And it’s a church.”
“I think it’s been a while since this place has been considered holy.” Theodore glanced significantly at the cracked, weathered wood of the benches, then knelt to run a hand along the floor. When he lifted it, the dust he’d wiped off had mixed with the water running over his skin to form a dark, slimy layer. He wrinkled his nose and scraped it off on the bench leg. “And besides, I’ve got precious few days left to enjoy the latitude allowed to young scoundrel lieutenants.”
Will spread one cloth over the planks and then threw the other one over their knees as they sat with their backs to the pew. He smoothed his hand over Theodore’s knee and down to the other man’s lap, brushing the intrigued swelling there before delving beneath the hem. “So it’s for certain? You and Gillette to captain?”
“And Wellard and Knightley to lieutenant, but they’re going back to Europe and we’re being shipped…mmm…” Theodore let his knees fall laxly apart “…pair of babies to toughen up. Damn aristocratic string-pulling—how the devil are we supposed to explain undead pirates? And any of the…oh, yes, that’s it.”
“You and Norrington will think of something,” Will dryly said. If James Norrington could deal with Jack Sparrow and…and Will wasn’t going to think about precisely how his father related to Norrington, but obviously that was complicated as well…then he shouldn’t have too much of a problem introducing new officers to the peculiarities of the Caribbean outpost. If he did—then that was entirely his difficulty, and Will was very thankful not to be responsible for it.
A warm, slightly yielding weight pushed onto his shoulder. Theodore nuzzled at Will’s jaw a bit before rising and delicately working the tip of his tongue around the curves of Will’s ear. He outlined twists and coils that Will hadn’t known his ear possessed. “You know, I was always a bit jealous of Elizabeth,” Theodore murmured. “Damned shame that captains have to be spotless and upstanding, else…”
Will turned his head and caught the other man’s lips in a long kiss.
They were presently quite warm, and surprisingly comfortable beneath the drapes. The storm began to wither away to rain alone, and even that softened from its earlier incessant beat to a lullaby drizzle. Soon Theodore’s head drooped from Will’s shoulder and the temptation to doze looked ever more appealing to Will. But he remembered the woman, and also the mistakes that had nearly cost him his life a few times before, and so before he settled down for a nap he dragged his sword to lie by his hip.
It was impossible to tell how long he’d been asleep, but Will hadn’t missed the warm weight beside him for very long. He knew that because he could see Theodore just walking around the pew. Will opened his mouth to call out to the other man, then shut it because he could hear something. A soft, shivering kind of susurration that was coming from the front. That was cloyingly sweet, that slipped about him and simpered of sleep and darkness…
Will shook it off and silently picked up his sword, crawling after Theodore. He kept low to the ground and directly behind so he couldn’t be seen by whoever was making the sound. That was hardly difficult, for Theodore did not move like an aware man but like one in a dream, his steps heavy and awkward. A slight tap to the back of his knee brought no response, and he continued to move forward.
The air stank. Drenched in the smell of rage—metallic, pungent, never to be forgotten—and of things that shouldn’t walk on the earth. It was so strong that Will wondered at missing it before.
They were moving towards the altar; Will abruptly remembered the woman. He carefully nudged an inch of his sword from its scabbard and held it so the reflection would catch whatever was before them. There were the steps, the altar…the woman, now standing. But she stood higher than any woman had a right to stand, and her clothes fell in an odd slackness to either side of her, as if she were very, very slender. Her arms were raised but no hands were visible, and the hissing sound seemed to come from her. “Yesss, yess, closer. Closer so that I can have my revenge, murderer of my husssband…”
Any further and Theodore would be in range for a strike, though it didn’t look as if the woman carried a weapon. Nevertheless Will took no chances. He rolled onto his feet, then slammed Theodore into the benches to the left and drew his sword in the same motion. A fortunate choice, for the woman recoiled and something flashed out from her sleeves; Will swept his blade around to block and struck solidity.
Two red coals flared beneath the woman’s hood and she screamed, but her scream was that of a gigantic hissing monster. Something red and thin and long flickered out from her hood, and then she rushed Will. He whipped around and sought to slice her across the back, but she was fast as lightning. Faster, for hot pain struck over his cheek and her robes rustled high in the rafters before he knew it.
“Will? What are you doing?” Theodore had caught himself by hooking an arm over a pew-back and now was pulling himself up. He stared wildly, dazedly, as if he’d just woken up.
Above them, the woman was flashing from rafter to rafter with supernatural speed, and all the while she was hissing about murderers and her husband and vengeance. Will grew dizzy trying to whirl around to face her. “The woman! She’s mad—damn it, your sword!”
No fool, Theodore didn’t need to be told twice. He leaped for the corner without looking back. The woman dove after him and Will after her. He jumped onto the pew-backs and ran to keep ahead of his teetering balance on the rotten wood, sword raised to chop at her legs. But from out of nowhere something whipped his foot out from under him and he nearly crashed to the floor. Sheer focused fear kept him from falling all the way. His knee cracked on the bench and his palm on the pew-back, and then he shoved himself up just in time to roll over whatever the woman was swinging around behind her. Will had whirled and his sword had caught it lashing back before he could even think about whether it was a rope or…
…an enormous scaly tail fell to the ground and spouted hot red blood into his eyes. Stumbling and clawing it away, Will scrambled into the aisle. He looked up just in time to see Theodore slash madly at an equally large snake’s head that was rearing out of the woman’s dress. “Jesus Christ.”
“Will! Get her—” The snake lunged and Theodore threw himself aside just in time to avoid her fangs.
She crashed through the planks. The moment she needed to free herself gave Will time to finish hopping benches and get to Theodore’s side.
“Can you get rid of her?” Theodore panted, sword held at the ready.
Will watched the snake rip her head free and lash furious coils to spring away from them. Her baleful red eyes spoke death to him. “I think I could. But it’d take a while and you know, using a sword would be fast—”
“Murderers!” she snarled. And she snapped out her full length, hundreds of pounds of muscle and maddened anger turning her into a living cannonball. Armed with fangs.
Theodore and Will did the sensible thing and each dove in the opposite direction. As soon as he’d landed, Will spun around and cut a long gash down the snake’s side, but that barely slowed her. She had chosen to go after Theodore and now he was barely holding off her fangs with his sword, the effort already having sent him to his knees. He was wheezing and his arms were shaking hard.
Will looked desperately about, spotted a length of splintered wood and scooped it up. He threw it straight at her eye, but a stick wasn’t the same as a balanced dagger and it hit her beneath the jaw. But that was enough for her to slacken. Theodore exploded out from under her, turned and flung his sword so it went straight through her throat.
It stopped the hissed words, but not her attack. She drove for Theodore again and he tripped over the hole she’d made while trying to dodge. “You whoring bitch—” he cursed, clawing himself free too late.
But she ignored Will’s further exploits at her own expense, for he’d kept going towards her after he’d thrown the stick. Now he skidded to a stop, foot braced against her side, and swung with all his force. Her scales smashed his blow but didn’t slow it enough; his sword had gone more than halfway through her neck when one of her coils rammed into him and sent him into the wall. The impact was stunningly painful.
He still forced himself up and was about to take another swing when Theodore called to him. “Will--Will! She’s dead.”
And she was. Her body, only half-uncoiled, was long enough to span the church, and her head, hanging loosely from the thin piece of muscle and skin that still connected it to her body, was as big as a small sheep.
Will staggered to his feet and leaned hard against the wall. Theodore stumbled back till he was slumped beside Will, and for a moment they did nothing but pant for air and stare.
“Next time…” Not enough air. Another breath, and Will tried again. “Next time, we’re chancing the pirates. I don’t care how many of them there are, or what detours you know.”
* * *
“Forgive me if this offends, but that sounds like something out of Revelations. I understand the snakes here grow to prodigious sizes, but…intelligent ones? And shouldn’t you have, ah, noticed her tail before?” Horatio was trying very hard not to sound condescending, but he wasn’t quite managing. He kept tucking his chin into his chest and pulling at his nose.
Not having Horatio’s sense of decorum, Archie snickered and didn’t bother hiding it.
Will shrugged as he knocked on the door. He spoke briefly with the housekeeper, and then stepped back as the door swung open. “Well, I don’t pretend to understand everything, sirs.” A quick smile, and then he was turning into a different corridor. But first he pulled something from his bag and handed it to Horatio. “And this is where my errand differs from yours. But could you do me a favor and return this to Commodore Norrington when you see him?”
“Certainly…” Horatio’s voice trailed off as he first glanced, then stared at what Will had handed him. For what it appeared to be but couldn’t possibly…it was a gigantic fang, set in an elaborately-worked gold handle.
He and Archie made their way into Norrington’s house in edgy silence.
After a while, Archie coughed. “This is going to be interesting, isn’t it?”
“Are you referring to the ghosts or the snake-demon?” Horatio muttered, hand over his face. He dropped the fang on a side-table and rubbed his hand over his coat a few times.
“I’m actually trying to avoid thinking about those. Did it sound to you that Will was censoring himself—not in regards to the snake, but to Captain Groves?” Archie mused.
Something in Archie’s voice made Horatio pinch the bridge of his nose even harder. “Archie.”
“I know, I know, the snake and the ghost are important. But Mr. Turner apparently seems to know how to handle himself around them, so…”
“Never mind those when you’re around,” Horatio sighed.
***