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Author: Guede Mazaka
Rating: NC-17. Major (off-screen) character death. Slight BD.
Pairing: Jack/Will, Will/James, Jack/Will/James. Ref. to Jack/Will/Elizabeth, Will/Elizabeth and James/Elizabeth
Feedback: Good lines, bad errors, and anything in between.
Disclaimer: Belongs to a family-friendly mouse, who undoubtedly would be horrified if he ever caught wind of this.
Notes: Dedicated to the ever-wonderful fabu for various reasons.
Summary: After his life comes to a crashing halt, Will resharpens himself.
***
Will stopped counting days after the funeral. He simply let the sun pass overhead and the tides roll onto the beaches, uncaring whether it was in fact he who had been buried.
A surprising number of people seemed to believe the difference did matter, and went to great unnecessary lengths to persuade him to agree with them. Weat-Governor Swann even offered to buy passage for Will anywhere he was pleased to go.
It was a generous suggestion, considering the damning glints that Will caught in his-former-father-in-law's eyes whenever the Governor wasn't quite looking at him. But Will couldn't accept. Not because it was here that-that-the bodies were laid to rest; having seen Barbossa's final end, Will knew better than most men the discrepancy between animating spirit and dull flesh. None of them still lingered in this tropical paradise. So Will could leave. But except for one particular island, he had nowhere to go where he would feel comfortable.
Isla de Muerte, however, was not to be found by those had not already been there, and thus already learnt the way. Will had set foot on that ancient graveyard of ships and men, but, as was typical of his life, he had not the slightest idea how the way to it led. He had been brought, which was a far sight different from going. As different as treasure and gold. As different as a blacksmith and a pirate.
Jack knew how to get there, but somehow, Will didn't think Jack would be fooled by any kind of false cheer and story of lies. It'd be, 'And how's the lass?' And then Will would break open afresh.
Besides, as indifferent as Will was at the moment, he still felt something…obligatory… toward the other man. Enough to keep Will from calling Jack to the same town that housed the Empire's scourge of the Caribbean.
"William?"
Who for the third time this week was bothering to stop by at the start of the day, patently hoping to find the furnace lit and new swords lining the walls. Norrington should know better by now. Norrington shouldn't care by now-or if he did, it should be for…for…
"It's been three months since-"
Glaring past the blear that edged his sight, Will cupped his other hand over the hilt to steady it so the sword point wouldn't drift from the Commodore's throat. "Don't. Say. Her. Name."
He was going to be clapped in irons and hanged for this. Will wondered what crimes the executioner would read out for the occasion.
But Norrington only took a step back, sniffing the air. "You're drunk again."
"Mr. Brown left quite the supply." The blade felt heavy as a cannonball, dragging at Will's arm and making it shake. Forcing it to drop the sword, which scattered sparks where it struck the anvil against which he was leaning. Blinking slowly, Will watched one jump into his soiled sleeve and grow into a small, bright flame. "That's pretty…"
"Turner!" And suddenly water was sloshing over him, filling his nose and mouth with brackish foulness. Sputtering vicious swears, Will flung himself backward and promptly cracked his head on something hard. Stars sprung out of his eyes, then flared brilliant in the descending night.
***
This was certainly not the best idea James had ever had, but to put matters frankly, he was at a complete loss as to alternative solutions. Sighing, he settled his wig more firmly upon his head-
Rattle.
--gritted his teeth, and ignored the furious racket emanating from the other side of his bedroom door. Hopefully, his bedpost would hold till he could finish the day's work and return. The manacles holding Will to James' furniture were of the blacksmith's own make, so logically they should be more than sufficient to prevent the younger man from doing anything foolish. On the other hand, James distinctly remembered inspecting the jail after Sparrow and Turner had made off with the Interceptor and finding that the bars had somehow been wrenched completely off their hinges.
At the other end of the room, a knock on the far door was barely audible. Firmly plastering on his most professional face, James crossed over and opened the door only to find the worst possible person standing in his hallway.
"Your man showed me up…" Governor Swann began uncertainly, raising his voice to be heard over the clanking.
"Norrington! Y'bastard, y'can't keep me here forever! I'm a citi-cit-good man of the Empire!"
James winced and hastily came out, locking the door behind him. "I think the parlor might be a more suitable place for any discussions that you wish to hold, sir."
"Was that Mr. Turner?"
Mister. The coldness of the word inexplicably stung James to the quick, curling his fists tight till the cut of his nails into his palm brought him to his senses. Fortunately, it seemed that the Governor had taken James' silence as a natural response to an awkward question.
After ushering the other man into the parlor, James poured them both a generous amount of rum before taking a seat himself and finally answering. "Yes, that was. I paid him a visit at the forge earlier, and…as he seemed to pose not only a danger to himself, but to his neighbors as well, I took the liberty of ensuring his safety. Though the jail doesn't seem a suitable place for him, considering the-"
"-the circumstances," Governor Swann completed, his face showing absolute understanding. "I have to say I agree."
"You wouldn't happen to have any idea why his behavior…" Trailing off, James sipped his drink, then gazed uncomfortably at the swirling liquid.
Swann winced, and the grating rustle of lace and brocade snapped James' head back up. He stared for a full minute at the other man, but then, belatedly remembering that deference to higher authorities generally did not include hard glowers, tried his best to soften his expression.
"I'm afraid it may have something to do with a comment I made during-" Swann swallowed, then wetted his lips with the rum "-Elizabeth's labor. I…more or less blamed Will for putting her in such a condition, and he took it badly."
"Extremely," James muttered. At the Governor's second flinch, James twitched and lowered his head to rub the bridge of his nose. "My sincerest apologies, Governor Swann. I know it was a horrific night."
"No offense taken." Swann opened his mouth, then shut it and stood up, patiently waiting for the flustered James to do likewise. "I actually came here to see if you could do anything for William. I…" he fidgeted, then glanced up to reveal a surprising strain of mournful compassion in his eyes "…I've felt somewhat responsible for him ever since we pulled Will from the water, ten years back, and…and Elizabeth made me promise to watch for him. But I find that even three months later, I can't bear to look directly at him. Which shames me."
"Ah…" James had not the slightest hint of an idea how to deal with this kind of revelation.
"So you'll bring William to his senses, I trust?" Hope slowly diffused itself into Governor Swann's haggard face, restoring it to something like its previous benevolence.
"I will try to the utmost of my abilities," James replied, inwardly squirming. He was being honest, but the vow still tasted like rotting meat on his tongue. But the other man smiled, either seeing something that James didn't, or feeling so desperate that he was willing to believe in a lifelong navy man who knew the sound of cannonfire better than the songs children chanted in the streets.
"Of course, of course." Swann took one step towards the door, then half-turned, face expectant. "I suppose you won't mind if we discuss a few other matters, now that I'm here? My carriage can take you to the fort."
"Certainly." Picking up his hat and coat, James silently prayed that nothing else serious would happen today. He wasn't sure how many more crises he could safely juggle.
***
It was the bleeding that finally stopped Will's struggling. Not the listless muscles, not the ache of fatigue and the lancing pain around his wrists. The blood. Bright red, dripping from the bites his own handiwork had taken out of him. Soaking into the sheets, spangling them in an ominous rain that suddenly rang his ears full of screaming.
"Oh, God, Elizabeth," he wept, going limp and burying his head into the blankets. "I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry…"
Salt-not sea salt, which was invigorating and fresh-seared across Will's eyes, burning the regret into him. And reality flooded back into him, drowning out the drunken cloudiness and filling his lungs with emotion. Grief, anger, guilt. Everything under the sun poured in until Will burst apart, the color and smell and sound shocking back into him.
Very gradually, he uncurled and raised his head, blinking away the tear crusts and taking stock of the room. Door. Walls. Furniture. Ironwork scones with white candles-the exact hue of Elizabeth's cheek when they had laid her out.
"And your father wouldn't let me see," Will breathed, a last sob still ragging his voice. "Didn't want me to see what a wreck I made of you."
She was dead.
"What a wreck I've made of everything. I had to break down the door, you know." Smile of irony and bitterness stretching itself across his face, he wrestled his uncooperative limbs into a half-sitting position against the headboard, letting his wrists fall where they may. Behind their dragging grooves, dull links and vivid crimson swooped over the fine fabric. "I needed to see what you left behind before they put that into the ground. Then I got drunk, and I've been drunk ever since. Even on your funeral."
Will raised his hands, then roughly tested the chains until the hurt was too great and he had to drop them. More red trickled out, warming the cold sheets. "Actually, I almost was sober then. But then I saw everyone's faces, and they were so…so…stupid. Sorry for you, and hateful for me. And Jack didn't come."
As he stared about, Will found the ceiling and carpet and walls creeping up on him, forcing him to slump backwards. Their sparse elegance swam before his eyes, occasionally leaping out to make him startle. "Norrington was there. So Jack couldn't be."
Black bordered the fringes of his vision. "It's not fair. Elizabeth. It's not. They sat with me for one night, so why couldn't they stand with me for one day? For you?"
She wasn't coming back.
"I can't do this, Elizabeth," Will whispered, his head sliding down to land a cheek in one sticky pool of scarlet. "I can't make miracles. I can't make anything. I can't make it alone."
"Y'aren' alone," replied a voice, soft and strained.
"Liar." And then the sea rose in his ears, cradling him in rum-scent and exotic jangling.
"Will? Will!"
He slept.
***
"Damnation," Jack swore, swiftly tearing clean strips from the commodore's beautiful linen and stuffing them under the bloodstained manacles. As far as he could tell, it was a nasty mix of physical and mental exhaustion that had sent Will into the waves of night, and the blood wasn't trickling out nearly fast enough to kill the idiot whelp. But its loss wouldn't be doing him any good, either. "An' damn you for puttin' on such a brave face of it till after I left."
Having wrapped the lacerations with the best makeshift bandages he could manage, Jack set about finding means of more professional dressing. Fortunately-one thing that was-Norrington's personal effects were just as prissily organized as the man's daily routine. Which had been rather publicly disrupted today, allowing Jack not only to sneak into Port Royal, but also to, upon finding the mess of a forge, deduce just where Will had been taken hither.
Jack yanked the soiled bedding off the mattress, then carelessly kicked it to one side as he flitted about the room, collecting bowls of water and better bandages and a few glittery trinkets for later. He briefly debated checking out the contents of the desk in the corner, but a slight movement on the bed brought him back to Will's side, painstakingly scraping the sweat, blood and tears from the other man's face and arms. No matter how hard Jack tried, however, he couldn't seem to clean away the sorrow engrained into the hollowed face.
Will woke sometime after Jack had finished padding cotton under the manacles, groaning as he turned over in Jack's lap to blink woozily. "You…here."
"'pears so." One eye still fixed to Will, Jack continued to flip through the random novel he'd found in one drawer. "Y're not lookin' anythin' near fine, Turner."
"Elizabeth died." And all major and minor gods, but that voice was like a stormwind shaking Jack's bones. Not that he showed it, though he did surreptitiously tug Will closer to him. Leaving on the chains had been a good idea, after all…interesting that it was Norrington who'd thought of it. "And I fell apart."
"I noticed." Jack didn't mean for that to sound quite so sharp-the boy already looked fragile as bubbles-but Will didn't seem to register the tone. Or maybe he didn't care. Jack hadn't decided which would be worse. "Will…I told you t'send word if you needed-needed…"
"Needed what?" Eyes slipping from rust to cave crystal splinters, the other man began to rise, but was stopped by the manacles. "Why are these still on me?" Will demanded, rattling his bonds.
"Why shouldn' they be?" Jack retorted, tossing the book onto the side-table. "I've been here but a few hours, an' I can tell y're not rightways up."
"Oh. So you're with them." As he flopped back onto Jack's thighs, Will twisted his mouth, momentarily shaping himself into a living replica of a stained-glass saint. "Pray tell, what would be the right course of action for me?"
"Not this." Tone firm and decisive, Jack quashed all the unfamiliar uncertainties currently making free in his belly. "Y'can' just float along, Will. Sink or swim. 'course, if you'd be sinkin', then I'd have to drag y'out an' possibly hit you…"
"Some choice," Will muttered, trying to crawl away from Jack. Which wasn't permitted. Heaving him back, Jack locked his arms about Will's twisting body, holding fast as according to the dictates of fairy lore. And right now, the other man was acting more than a bit fey. "What's the point, Jack? Why did you save Elizabeth from drowning and risk getting recognized? Why did I go haring off across the Caribbean to get her back? Why did we kill Barbossa, if she was only going to die anyway?"
"William." Jack crushed a squeak from Will, then tilted his head to spill urgent, fierce words in Will's ear. "First of all, I killed Barbossa, an' that had nothin' to do wi' Elizabeth. Secondly, y'can' think like that. It makes no sense."
"And who are you to lecture me about logic?" Will hissed, yanking at his wrists. Growling under his breath, Jack clamped the other man between his legs, then seized Will's hands so they couldn't move and repaint the bed with swathes of crimson.
"Who are you t'lecture me about loss? Three months t'nine years." Jack skimmed his fingertips over the cotton strips, over the cold iron, over the feverish skin. "Listen. Things don' connect like th'black-clothed fool in th'pulpit preaches. Your lass didn' have her life spared so she could die later. She got t'live because she got t'live. An' th'same for you."
"Elizabeth wasn't a ship." Low and vicious, Will's voice seemed determined to flay the skin off Jack's tender bits. Well, other men had tried and failed.
"Wasn't she?" Bowing his head to rest chin on Will's shoulder, Jack pressed them cheek to cheek so he could feel the swallows going down the long throat, so he could just hear the pounding of another heartbeat. "How'd she make you feel? Like flying? Like freedom?"
After a long, sour-strained moment, an answer came. "Yes."
"So…" Almost by itself, Jack's hand skated further up till it was taken into the clutch of ten roughened fingers.
"So now she's gone. And I'm caught. I can't do it, Jack." Despite the unforgiving severity of his words, Will sounded soft with resignation and regret. Pleading for a rope thrown his way. "I can't even begin to guess at how you managed it."
"Well…I am Captain Jack Sparrow." Against his cheekbone, the other man's mouth twitched, then curved slightly upwards. Will unconsciously nestled himself back into Jack, who had to remind himself that such delicate matters required precise timing. Which wasn't exactly his forte, especially with a well-formed young blacksmith in desperate need of comfort sitting in his lap, but Jack could handle it. "'sides, y're through th'worst of it."
"Am I?" Sullenness, tempered with misery, shaded over the faint, brief brightness in Will's expression. "You knew the Pearl was still on the seas. You knew there was a chance of getting her back. I don't."
Jack sighed, looking heavenward for patience and earthward for cunning. "I was never tryin' t'retake a mere ship, Will. I was regainin' m'world. There are…there should be ways for you, still."
"You mean replace Elizabeth with something else." Will jerked himself away, staring at Jack with betrayal shining forth from his face like the glint of moonlight over bare bone and sword. "You-"
Weary feet clunking on the stairs, slightly left of accuracy so they resembled the ticking of a clock whose gears had warped a bit. Moving like quicksilver, Jack slid off the bed and assembled whatever effects he had put down. He took one step towards the beckoning window, then turned back and grabbed Will by the shoulders. "I mean, don' die when y'don' need to. Two dead bodies don' make a life, an' there's more here for y'yet."
Lunging as far out as his tether would allow him, Will wrapped his fingers in Jack's sash. "Then tell me what that is. Give me something I can hold onto."
In the hall beyond, hinges creaked, letting someone walk into the first room.
"This isn' th'time, Will. Too soon after her-"
"Show me!"
Jack's gaze flickered from man to door to man, his chest pushing in on itself as if he was deep underwater, the pressure nearly too much to bear.
"Jack-"
And then there was hot tangling crush, sickly desolation giving way under Jack's assault to tropical steam and sweet ripe fruit, too citric bursting on his tongue to come from any deadlands. Jack had known, he had known that under all that ash and cinder, something yet grew, rooting itself in the past and drawing strength from catastrophe.
He kissed Will with everything he'd always held back from saying, writing every thought he'd had about the boy and the girl who'd reversed his luck, but hadn't dared voice in face of the beautiful glow the two had created between them. And he let his own mourning rise up to the surface, letting it mingle with the new fire, sparking the flames with spice-biting incense.
A key scraped in the lock.
Will's eyes were wide and dark and eclipsing as Jack backed himself to the window, fingers just sussing out the frame of the sill before he would've stumbled. "Wait," he hissed, a bare moment before falling over the edge of the earth.
***
When James entered the room, the first thing that his attention directed itself to was Will's startled face and split lip. The second thing was the heap of red-spotted blankets on the floor, and it was only after he checked the other man for serious injuries-observing the bandages with something very near ironic expectation-that he realized the window was still flapping open. "Sparrow."
"What?" Will blinked innocently, entirely too docile in James' light hold.
"And his head start is undoubtedly too large for me to even bother trying, so you can drop the pretenses." Having finished examining Will's wrists, James tidied up most of the room, then pulled the window shut, absently noting the various broken branches and dented bushes that he would have to mention to the gardener. "You seem livelier than this morning."
"Why do you care? Shouldn't you be blaming me like everyone else?" Slumped on the pillows, Will resembled a slightly cleaner, much more sober version of his earlier deathly depression. "Even after Elizabeth dropped you, you still came round and visited her."
"Turner…" A migraine had been simmering all afternoon in James' head, and now it was pounding full force against his temples. Slowly, as if his limbs had the tremors of old age, he carefully removed the trappings of his station: hat, wig, sword, coat. "I never begrudged her choice. And no one lays any fault at your doorstep, because there is none. There can't be a fault in such a…a tragedy."
"Wrong goddamn word for it."
"William!" James snapped, long-suppressed ire finally coming up in one violent fracturing of politeness. "You are not. The only one. Who misses her."
"Did you love her?" the other man demanded, undeterred by James' anger. Will drew himself up as tall as he could, given his restraints, and shot a penetrating, baleful gaze over to James. "Did you? Or was she only pleasant and friendly and suitable to your position?"
"She wasn't-" James irritably flung himself into a chair, then dropped his head into his hands, pressing the palm heels into his eyes in a futile attempt to ease the aching. He laughed, once. "Elizabeth was everything a woman should and shouldn't be. Her father once said that at times, he didn't know what to make of her, so he could only cherish her. I concur."
A timid rap at the door brought him staggering over to find a servant proffering a large plate of food. Momentarily confused, James blankly took the dish with a murmured thanks and closed the door, then stared at the deliciously-scented clumps of meat and vegetables. "Oh, yes," he realized. "Dinner."
"That's a lot for one man." Will squeezed himself up to the headboard, as far from James as possible, and warily eyed the food.
Equally cautious, James set a chair down by the side of the bed and put the plate down on the side-table. "Some of it is for you."
"I'm not hungry." Shuffling backwards, Will nevertheless couldn't help darting glances at the appealing arrangement of food. His stomach rumbled, filling his cheeks with patches of rose. "I already ate."
"Somehow I doubt that." James didn't point out that Will looked thinner than a skeleton, or that unless Sparrow had managed to whisk a banquet table in and out the window, the blacksmith certainly hadn't had anything substantial all day. Mainly because rumor obviously had done enough to damage Will, and James had no intention of originating any more gossip. "You're going to eat, Turner."
"You keep changing what you call me," Will muttered. When James shifted right, the other man went left; when James leaned forward, Will bent back. As if they were playing out some ridiculous children's game. "And you never said why you're bothering-" comprehension ripped itself across Will's eyes, letting the bitterness seep out "-if it's because you feel some obligation towards Elizabeth, then you can stop. I won't be anyone's burden, and I can't be her relic for you."
Resting his hands on the edge of the bed, James distantly watched as his fingers curled in till the knuckles were bone-colored bulging blisters. For some odd reason, his voice was shaking. "You aren't, you fool. I am capable of caring for more than one person."
"What does that mean?" Expression incredulous, Will unthinkingly ducked down so he could see James' face. Thus reminding James about the open window and the mess and the swollen lips.
"It doesn't matter," he answered roughly, turning to the cooling food and dividing it into two portions. "It never matters."
"But-"
"I'm confident that Jack could tell you whenever he chooses to return." James took a bite of every serving, testing for quality even though at the moment, he couldn't taste anything over the bile choking up his throat. "He seems to know how to get what he wants."
Soft jangling as two bound hands hesitantly touched the spoon, holding it still. Head bent over the plate, Will seemed almost in prayer, though the slanted glance watching James was anything but sacred in mood. "I thought you were happy with what you were. Everyone talks about what good you've done here, and how you're a model officer."
"And I believed that you knew better than to listen to other people's opinions. You've never shown any inclination towards that before."
Will let out a warning hiss and stiffened with indignation, but didn't move except to turn his head so he could stare straight at James. In silence vibrating with unspoken nerves and palpable tension.
"Damn-" James began, looking away, but Will said it first.
"I'm sorry," he sighed, falling back onto the bed in a crumple of untended clothing and tired limbs. "I know Elizabeth meant a lot to you, at any rate."
Which was quite the wrong thing to say.
Head shooting up, James blinked at the rocking table and the faint scarlet smearing one side. Pain suddenly fragmented through his fist, and beside him, Will stammered something. Raising his other hand, James cut off the babble. He stood and hastily smoothed down his clothing, keeping his bleeding knuckles well away from it. "Will. I felt deeply for Elizabeth, but she wasn't the subject of this discussion. You were."
Halfway out the door, James paused and spoke, mostly to the empty space before him. "I'll leave the food with you, and I would greatly appreciate it if you decided to eat it."
***
Will felt like he'd just been made to look a complete idiot. And he was beginning to hurt.
"God, my head…" Sinking into the soft mattress, he muffled every curse he'd ever learnt in the bedding that still remained. He'd forgotten how painful sobriety was. For that matter, he'd forgotten how painful living was, as opposed to just existing. Will gingerly raised his head to investigate what he'd done to his wrists, only to catch a whiff of piquant roasted meat that tugged oddly at his stomach. Not entirely in a good way.
He was hungry, for the first time in days. He also was sick and lightheaded, and absolutely confused about everything. Then Will's belly took a funny leap and lurch, and suddenly there was no time to reflect on anything. "Damn, damn, damn," he hissed, hastily crawling to the side of the bed and looking for a container.
There had to be a chamber pot, at the least. And if Will leaned all the way over, he could see a bit of porcelain peeking out of the ruffles lining the bedframe. He stretched out-
--and found his arms were about five inches too short. "God damn i-"
Whipping his head about, Will glimpsed a pile of stained cloth barely within reach. He leaned over half a second before the bile broke free and forced itself up through his mouth, burning throat and tongue and even the very back of his nose, making him sneeze in between retches. Of their own accord, his eyes fluttered shut till he had finished and was disgustedly wiping off his face on the only bit of clean blanket he could grab. Will glowered at the stinking splotches, then averted his gaze. Towards the dish on the table and the scents that made his newly-emptied stomach quiver.
The complete ridiculousness of the whole scene struck him about halfway through his aggravated sigh, drawing an agonized-but cleansing-chuckle from him. And then another, and another, till Will finally doubled over and had himself a decent long laugh. After all, what else could he do?
Get out of the briar thicket. Pick up his sword and keep hacking till he broke through to the castle with no princess. That was what Jack, and apparently, Norrington, wanted him to do. But the why of it…
"Well, start with what I know." Will parted his lips to name the first, then lost his breath. But this time, his determination stayed, and it clenched his fingernails into his palms, driving the words out of him as a storm's leading edge would ships. "Elizabeth is dead. Our child is dead. That was…"
Will! Will, I'll be all right. I love you.
Haven't you done enough to my daughter?
In his head, the thundering and roaring grew to a giant's drumbeat, shaking his entire body. "That was…"
Don' die when y'don' need to.
She wasn't the subject of this discussion. You were.
He sucked in a great hunk of air, almost feeling its freshness scour his insides. "That was not my fault."
Will exhaled, and the departing breath dragged a great iron anchor out of him, its wicked hooked ends snagging and tearing, but nevertheless leaving him. Body abruptly trembling with exhaustion-the good kind, the fatigue of a hard day's fruitful labor-he drooped sideways, staring at the wall across from him as if he'd never seen it before. In point of fact, he hadn't. Not really. Not without a slender ghost's skirts in the way.
But now, she was more gone than ever before, and Will was still empty. Merely slightly less blind about it. "I can't go on like this. I have to-to figure something out."
First, his perverse appetite reminded him, he needed a full belly. Though Will wasn't altogether certain that his strength would be equal to lifting a spoon. "Norrington?" he called, hoping a little and doubting a lot.
A minute later, the door opened and the commodore poked his head inside. "Yes?"
Will was briefly stunned, but quickly shook off his surprise. And his embarrassment, as he remembered the doubly-soiled sheets on the floor and realized the type of figure he must cut. "Could you help me with-with eating?"
***
As he raised the last forkful of pork to Will's lips, James resolutely kept his gaze focused somewhere on the other man's forehead, which was a fairly neutral area. "If I took off the manacles, could I trust you not to…"
Through a mouthful of food, Will mumbled something, then blushed prettily and hurriedly swallowed. "Sorry. I said, I won't do anything. Stupid."
James returned the plate to the side-table, then subjected Will's face to intense study, searching for any trace of dissembling. Finding none, he produced the key from a pocket, then paused once more. "I have your word."
"Ye-" Will's eyes narrowed "-if you answer something for me."
Fingers inadvertently crushing themselves around the key prongs, James winced and dropped the skinny piece of metal. He leant down to pick it up, but had only made it part of the way when a pair of hands latched onto his sleeve cuff.
"Looks like you caught yourself on a bit of meat," Will murmured, plucking the fragment off and flicking it onto the dish. Without letting go of the sleeve. On the contrary, his fingertips continued onwards to graze against the tiny cuts on James'. "And you're bleeding."
"So I am." If the blacksmith wasn't going to move, then James certainly wasn't planning to, either. "So were you. I suppose I should thank Sparrow for ensuring that you didn't bleed yourself out on my bed."
"Would you hang him?" Will asked in an abrupt tone, tightening his grip. With his head craned like that, he looked quite the loyal terrier. And then Will's expression changed, aggression segueing to shy deerlike fear. Predator become prey. "Would you have hung me that day, if Elizabeth hadn't come to my side?"
"I never have and never will see the point in 'what-ifs.'" James tried to covertly free himself, but only succeeded in making Will pull him even closer.
"Selfishness yields odd returns, it seems." Will leaned out till he was teetering on the very brink of the mattress, wisping warm breath along the side of James' neck. "I drown in mourning, and both you and Jack decide to take an interest. Why? Is it because of Elizabeth?"
"Is it really so hard for you to believe it's due to yourself?" James snapped, jerking himself away. He got half out of the chair, then sank back, resting elbow on one chair arm and laying his head on his hand. "This morning, you didn't care if you lived or died. Now, you care whether I want you to live or die. To put it in honest terms, Will, it's suspicious. Do you actually know what you're doing at this moment, or are you simply trying to seize the nearest substitute?"
All color having fled from his cheeks, Will visibly clenched his jaw and threw himself as far from James as the chains would permit. "If I knew, I obviously wouldn't be interrogating you, would I. I'd be acting." He raised his chin pugnaciously, eyes glittering in the candlelight. "And I happen to think that it is important why you're helping me. Why you keep putting yourself forward as a-" his voice curled viciously on itself "--substitute."
"I am-how dare you!" Rising with such precipitation that he knocked over the chair, James stalked one pace towards the door, then threw up his hands and strode over to the window. "You threaten my life, you bleed and vomit on my sheets so that I have to have them buried in the garden, and now you dare suggest that I would take advantage of your unbalanced state?"
"Well…" Metal clinked uneasily, then fell silent. "Yes. I am."
The words were like a needle piercing completely through James' flesh, releasing all his anger and disappointment into the suddenly-stagnant air. So this was what the sudden stop felt like. Placing his palms on the wall by the window, James bent forward till he could rest his aching brow against the cool wallpaper. "You're right. It most likely is a factor."
"Since when?" Oddly enough, Will didn't sound nearly as condemning as James had always imagined.
"Will, I watched both you and Elizabeth grow up. She became a fine woman, and you a fine man. But the penal code says…not to mention social conventions…"
"And you're the man who told me never to listen to other people," Will snorted quietly, tone just a hairsbreadth from conspiratorial. "Not that I don't understand. But why change your mind now?"
"Because-" scarlet fluttered at the borders of James' sight, and he feinted a turn back to Will, then swiftly twisted back and flung open the window.
"Hey, watch it!" Browned fingers scrabbling for a handhold, the mass of ragged finery toppled over the sill and into the room with a loud thump. On the bed, Will's eyes went wide, then darted pleadingly towards James. Whose receding headache then decided to come back with twice the force. "Ah…wonderful evenin', isn' it, commodore?" Jack chirped cheerfully, hurriedly rolling onto his feet and backing towards Will.
Who had his gaze locked to James'. "Don't kill him. I can't see anyone else die. I can't."
Thousands of things flashed across James' mind: his ships, his men, his sword. Turner-made. Resignation buckled his knees, sending him sliding down the wall, and irony's faint saving grace kept his head up so he could look at Will. "I give up. I simply give up. I can't take this."
"'course y'can," Jack reassured him before stage-whispering to Will. "Take what?"
"What the hell are you still doing here?" Will demanded in lieu of a reply. "Are you mad-stupid question? Are you that eager to die?"
"Actually, that'd be you." Doffing his hat and carefully setting it down, along with his pistols, Jack perched himself on the bed and swiped a finger across Will's shock-frozen lips. "Mebbe-" he sniffed the finger "-mebbe not. You got him t'eat?"
***
Come to think of it, the commodore looked much, much better when he was flustered. Less…starchy. Which, considering the conversation on which Jack had been eavesdropping, would most likely be a very important fact to remember in the future.
On the other hand, Will was looking greatly improved. "Y'find y'r senses?" Jack politely inquired of the blacksmith.
"No, and they'll be beyond recovery if someone doesn't start giving me answers," Will retorted sharply, glaring at Jack and Norrington. "What do you want from me?"
"Your happiness." In duet. Well, well. Who could've guessed that Norrington would ever get it said, what with all the cow-eyes Jack had caught him making at both the Turners.
It didn't seem to help Will any, though. Growling, Will buried his head in the bed, then lifted it when James cautiously made his way to just out of Jack's reach. "And how am I supposed to know what will make me happy now? Just-" he appeared to be strangling himself "-I don't want to forget her, damn it. I don't want to betray her memory."
"Neither do I," James muttered, leaning down to right the fallen chair and pluck a key from the floor, which Jack noted went into a certain pocket. "I don't believe I currently am."
"An' you?" Laying a light hand on Will's shoulder, Jack fiddled with the shirt collar.
Will closed his eyes. "I don't think so. But how am I to know?"
Shrugging, Jack began to toe off his boots. "Y'can'. All that there is, is a trial in good faith."
"Does that go with 'Take what you can-give nothing back'?" Disbelieving with the weakest gleam of hope slipping round his pupils, Will looked up at Jack. "And how are you two going to work things out? Whose funeral will I have to attend next?"
"No one's, tonight," broke in Norrington's voice. Blinking owlishly, Jack glanced over at the commodore. "As for the future, that affair is between Sparrow and I."
"Captain. Jack. Sparrow. I'm dead certain a fine fellow like y'self can say it." Jack firmed up his gaze, feeling the clash and shiver of it against his opponent's. Slipping his arm around to encircle Will's waist, he lowered his voice from flippant to serious. "I've lost th'one. I won't lose th'other."
"And that would be the difference between you and I," Norrington replied, no less somber. "I've never presumed myself to have had either."
"If this is how you're planning to treat me, then I'll starve myself to death," Will snarled, jerking back from both men. "I am no man's prize."
Jack sighed, stripping off his coat as he crawled after the blacksmith. "I know. That's why th'whole thing's been so difficult. Why I didn' try for it before." Grabbing onto the chains, he held Will steady while he wrapped himself around the other man. "But I'll not let matters stand as they are anymore. Not wi'out knowin' whether there's a chance."
Beside them, the bed dipped under the weight of a third man. "This will be the only time I shall ever say this: I agree with you, Sparrow."
"Jack."
"James."
"On a first-name basis now, are we?" Jack's eyebrow rose, even as he grudgingly slipped off to one side in order to allow-James-some access to the still-recalcitrant Will. "That's int'resting."
"And I'm still not getting any ans-" The one eye of Will's that Jack could see over James' head fluttered lashes, surprised ire quickly dying away to soft tentative liking.
Reluctance characterizing his every movement, James pulled back just far enough to ask, voice grown hoarse, "Do we have an answer from you?"
Will stared from face to face, then lunged forward to smash his lips messily against James'. Not that the other man seemed to particularly mind, seeing as how he promptly opened up till Jack could glimpse pink slipping from mouth to mouth.
Shifting beneath Jack, Will dragged his lips up James' jawline till he slid free and could crane his head to press his mouth hesitantly to Jack's own. Offering up more of that lush fruit, and Jack wasted no time in pressing Will back into the pillows, kissing him till the manacles rattled. An elbow nudged in Jack's side as James edged into the curve of Will's neck, laying kisses down its length, and warm, too-clothed legs tangled with his own as the three of them awkwardly hauled themselves back to the other side of the bed. Briefly emerging from the spontaneous muddle of bodies, James managed to get one of Will's wrists unlocked before Jack's curiosity got the better of him.
"What-oh, God."
***
Will's head was soundly thumped as James' arms went flailing. "Sor-sorry," the other man hissed, reflexively jerking as Jack's fingers disappeared inside his trousers. James clumsily got up onto one elbow, then nearly toppled off the bed as Will took a lick at his ear.
Sweet. Tangy. Trailing his tongue further down, Will sucked and nibbled at the reddening skin stretched over one wing of James' collarbone. He wriggled his freed hand into the sash wrapped about Jack's waist, straining till he could stroke over silk-fine skin. Filling his mouth with something besides loss and ashes, imprinting his fingers with something besides broken glass and cold unspeaking metal.
And then hands were tugging at his own clothing, easing and ripping it out of the way so mouths and skin could brush over its iciness, warming it back to life. Jack's rum scent skated over Will's bared back, deft fingers tracing swirls and symbols over his spine, while the sea spray that had hinted itself from beneath James' bland official persona curled deep into Will's nose, breezing through his head. He gasped and arched into a wet mouth on his back, then moaned when that motion set his cock to rubbing against James'. "God, it's almost-almost enough…"
"Only a little past startin'," Jack murmured back, sounding slightly ragged. James didn't bother with words, but instead simply tugged Will back down to flicker tongue and graze teeth over Will's nipples. Which would have elicited more groans, except then a nail scratched down past the end of Will's backbone, dipping in and drawing a whimper back out with it.
A tumbling rain of bright colors caught Will's eye, making him glance over to see Jack's clothing puddled by the bed. Then James unexpectedly twisted and writhed, yanking Will's attention back just in time for him to be shocked into a deep welling kiss, Jack's slickened fingers caressing him from the inside on one end, James' tongue skimming across his teeth from the other.
Unexpectedly, both Will and James jolted apart. Shooting a hard look over Will's shoulder, James snapped, "Get on with it, Sparrow."
"Captain Jaaaa-acck," the pirate singsonged, whipping his fingers out with a completely unnecessary flourish. But before Will could gather together enough of himself to turn around and wring Jack's neck, a strong grip fastened itself to his hips and shoved him into a clenching furnace that hammered sparks into his dazed mind. Underneath him, James cried out, very nearly screaming. And then stiff heated flesh plunged into Will as well, rattling a soundless wail from him.
"Jack, his arm," James gasped, grabbing for sweat-slippery limbs as he tried to drag the three of them back up.
"Sorry," the other man muttered, helping to push so Will's arm wasn't bent quite as badly. Not that he'd actually noticed, with all the shifting and twisting and Christ Jesus, what the hell had Jack just done? It'd whited out Will's vision.
"Please. Oh, God, please." Wriggling desperately between the two of men, Will tried to hold his mind together. But he could taste salt beneath his nails, feel lips in his ears, smell sadness and joy and relief on his tongue. And now, holy Mother of God, Jack was moving, and James was doing the same, and Christ, but Will couldn't respond in any way except letting them rock him back and forth. "Please don't let me lose this. Please don't stop. Oh, please."
"Shhh." Jack mouthed Will's neck, as gentle as his thrusts were ferocious, then skated his lips down to meet James' coming up over Will's shoulder. "Shhh. Not plannin' to."
"Good," James blurted breathlessly, eyelids pinched shut in ecstatic strain. His legs suddenly came up to clasp Will's sides, compressing them as he bucked up and held that arc, then collapsed with a long, low gasp. Jack pressed a wide grin into Will's nape as he sped up the jerking of his hips, driving Will into another blinding storm of white.
The last thing Will saw before falling into the frothing whirlpool was James' face, and the last thing he felt was Jack coming within him.
***
He hadn't been there since that long, horribly sunny day three months ago. And then, he'd been close to passing out with drunkenness, so Will wasn't quite sure he remembered where it was.
Regripping his bundle, he took one slow step forward, then set his jaw and took another. And another, and another after that, until he had finally arrived and was shuffling his feet nervously by the base of the lovely stone. It was much taller than he thought.
"Your father picked a good monument," Will began, voice thick. "I…Elizabeth, I'm sorry that I haven't been by before this. But you wouldn't have wanted to see you. I would have been an embarrassment. A real one, not the-" he smiled a little "-'tea-party failure.' But…but I think I've got a handle on matters now. Well, as much as I can, anyway."
He unknotted the ties and unwrapped the cloth from around the shovel and the other package, which he set by the side of the grave, then quickly made a long trench in the ground, just deep enough to be beyond the reach of a stray dog. Taking up the second bundle, Will undid its wrappings to display three gleaming-bright blades, only one sheathed, to the richly clear sky. "One of the things I never got to tell you was that I met a Chinaman sailor once, who knew something about swords. He told me that in his country, the best swordsmiths always make them in pairs-a male and a female. They keep the female ones, and give away the male ones."
Will took two of the blades by their hilts and traced a brief sketch in the air with their tips, then gently laid them into the trench. He quietly looked at their beautiful spare lines, which the tears in his eyes were blurring. "I love you, Elizabeth. I always will."
After refilling in the furrow and stamping down the dirt, Will picked a few wildflowers growing nearby and laid them by the tombstone. Then he retrieved the third sword and rebound the cloth around its sheath. Tucking it under one arm, he straightened and walked out of the cemetery to a fairly sheltered alley, where he waited.
Soon enough, Jack sauntered in, flipping a spinning top over his fingers. Seeing Will, he dropped the toy and draped an arm around the blacksmith's shoulders. "Didn' keep y'too long, did I?"
"Honestly, Jack, you can stop following me now. I'm fine." Will took out the bundle and handed it over to the other man, who immediately began attacking the strings.
"Well, y'never know. 'specially as y'still won' go t'sea wi' me. I'm tellin' you, Will, y'need t'get back to y'r…" The rags flittered from Jack's stilled fingers, looking like miniature comets. "…it's a sword."
"Perfect balance," Will added encouragingly. Slanting a suspicious glance at him, Jack warily unsheathed the blade, then put it through a few paces.
"As y'say," Jack said questioningly as he resheathed the sword. "'s very fine one. Y'make it y'self?"
"Yes. Just like I did James'." Undaunted by Jack's triply chary expression, Will leaned in to steal a quick kiss. "And I don't want to know how you two settled things. I just want them to stay that way. All right?"
"S'pose I could manage that." After somehow attaching the sword to his sash, Jack lifted a hand and petted Will's side, looking uncharacteristically solemn. "I meant what I was sayin'. Y're at least half-pirate, Will; y'board a ship an' I promise y'that it'd make things right."
"Board a ship?"
"Board th'Pearl," Jack corrected, poking at Will's teasing mouth.
Smug grin fading from his mouth, Will glanced toward the fort looming in the distance. "Not today, Jack. But soon."
"Very soon, else I'll be draggin' y'from bed," Jack warned. Then the large feather in Will's hat caught his attention, irresistibly forcing his fingers up to fluff it. "Or t'bed. Care t'go?"
"I'll probably regret this later, but lead the way," Will said, smiling again.
***