Decade: III
By Dream Descends

۞

Shipwreck's green craggy bluffs are glowing in the heat of the late afternoon. Jackie Turner scales the crumbling rock with all the nimbleness of youth, bright-faced, tongue protruding in deep concentration.

"Lookee, boy," a gravely voice comes from above. His escort's head appears over the gentle incline of the precipice, the deep lines of his face stretched in a rare smile.

"Captain?" He's breathless and, though he wouldn't admit it, rather afraid of looking anywhere but at the tops of his feet.

"To th' west. A ship."

The thrill is so unexpected Jackie near loses his grip and, embarrassingly, cries out in alarm. A steady hand grasps his wrist and hauls him back onto even land. "S'a fool thing to do," Teague mutters, shoving the boy's hat unceremoniously back onto his head. "Don't recommend falling off cliffs."

Jackie stares agog at the older man.

The pirate raises his eyebrows, swaying a bit as he reaches for the flask on his belt. "Well, go on." He gestures in the general direction of the cove. "Off, now."

The boy races off, and after a drink, Teague follows.

۞

Elizabeth spreads her arms as her son careens onto the wharf. The force of his small body is more welcome than painful, but still she detaches his clinging hands more quickly than usual. "You've grown," she laughs, pretending to measure him against her side. "A near foot, I'd say."

He beams appreciatively, his hair (which really has grown) clinging to the sweat of his rounded cheeks. "Hello, ma—mother."

She smiles slightly at the gravity of his tone. He's become a more quiet and pensive boy than she expected, but it doesn't worry her as often as it might—she remembers Will was just the same. "It's good to see you," she murmurs, and briefly embraces him again.

"He's in one piece." She looks up in time to see Teague's short nod of greeting. "And you might s'well know the Pearl made port, 'bout a fortnight ago."

"Yes!" The boy exclaims, a rare thing in and of itself. He pulls away to look eagerly up at his mother, and she knows he wants to be the first to break the news. "Uncle Jack's come to visit, ma—mother." She gives him the smile he's expecting and he returns it.

"That's wonderful, Jackie," she agrees, but the smile dies quickly when he turns away.

۞

"Jack?" The heady smell of old timber is comforting and familiar, but the rooms seem oddly vacant. It's unquestionably been lived in; the candles are gutted and the bed sheets unmade, but the activity is old. When she looks closely she sees a fine layer of dust covering the bureau, the trunk—all mismatched furniture. She stares at it a little longer. All stolen.

A sitting room is attached—the remnants of a wreck's great cabin, furnished with only a writing table, a settee, and a vastly inaccurate globe. She takes a few steps. "Jack?"

The sight of him is startlingly painful, as though something's just jabbed the fresh stitches in her side. He looks up from his charts, compass in hand, and the upward curve of his mouth is not a smile. "Lizzie." Her own fascination irritates her; what does she care for his shoulders, his jaw line, the shape of his voice?

"How nice of you to come see us," she says keenly, after a pause. It's inadequate but sincere, and she knows he knows. "Jackie's missed you."

"Safe to say he's the first." He gestures to the bottles, in varying degrees of emptiness, littering his desk. "Might I offer you a drink, your nibs?"

"You might," she agrees politely, and reaches out.

"Just choose one," he tells her, flapping a hand at them without glancing up. "And sit out of reach of any live flame or combustible substance, if you please."

She smiles unwillingly and takes a bottle, easing onto the settee.

"Are you here for long?"

He pauses, as though for thought, and then goes back to his maps. "My visit ends within the week, m'afraid. A shame, what with you only just arriving."

"Yes," she says quickly. "Yes, it is."

He grins, knowing she knows he knows she's lying. "Now, let's be honest, love."

She protests, merely out of ritual, but he brushes her rebuttals aside.

"And how are you finding captaincy—once again?"

She shrugs, watching him mark up his maps with an odd looping script that's utterly him. "I don't like being away from Jackie for so long. Two months, this time…it was too much."

"S'why I don't have children."

"You've a nephew, though, that might like seeing more of you."

He smiles humourlessly. "Will Turner was not my brother, love, and his son is every reminder of that."

She bristles at his dismissal, Jackie's vibrant face coming to the front of her mind. "And so you claim no attachment to the boy at all?"

Jack cocks his head, and for the first time it strikes Elizabeth that he might be as angry as she. "I was given the impression that was what you wanted, darling."

She sputters in disbelief. "Were you? And by who?" When he simply stares at her, she growls, "Don't amuse yourself by me, not when you presume to call yourself an honest man."

He's at last looking mildly offended, even though she's insulted him and at some point risen off her chair and planted her palms on either side of his damned maps. He's forced to meet her there, forced to lie to her face if he insists upon it.

"A man knows when he's unsought, love," he murmurs, and dares to turn away.

"Clearly not," she snarls, and grabbing his chin between her thumb and forefinger, she kisses him.

The ferocity and nerve are rather lost in her sudden uncertainty in what she's doing—she hadn't meant for this, not this at all, but he's—yes, he's kissing back and her body is coiled like a furious spring, remembering all the days and years it's been.

She's lost the control as soon as she's shown it off. Her knees that have climbed onto the table of their own accord are hooked forward by his hands, in a loud rush of parchment and torn fabric, and she thinks she might hear glass break, but he's gone on kissing her so it's no matter. He's rough and still angry and even slightly rude; his hand has curled into a fist around the hair at her neck, but more to keep her there than for anything else. His other arm is wound around her leg, pulling her right against him and his fingers cinching her waist—

She cries out. He stops suddenly. "Stitches," she gasps, and two pairs of trembling hands lift her shirt to reveal the livid red line that claws down her side.

The way he stares at it has her white with fear. Don't leave, she pleads silently, don't stop.

"I don't care," she insists, trying to pull the fabric back down. "It doesn't matter."

He pulls her hands away, gently but firmly, chiding her, "Lizzie." He lifts the shirt again, but he keeps going, and he doesn't move away. His eyes are dark. "I care," he mutters.

Her chest aches, and she realizes she's not breathing. As an afterthought, she helps him push the garment off her head, almost scrambling and then utterly still.

He takes both her hands and puts them 'round his neck, her cool fingers flaring over the heat. She clings to him.

۞

She can't tell what sweat is hers and what is his.

۞

The gutted candles have now collapsed entirely in wide pools of soft wax. He dips his finger in one and runs it down the trough between her breasts and over the rise of each rib.

"Jack."

He hushes her.

"Jack, there's something—"

A crunch, a hiss of pain.

"Oh. Oh—the ink pot—Jack—oh, hell, it's all over…"

"The charts, love."

She cries out wordlessly, trying to sit up. "Jack!" She struggles against him, uselessly. "They'll all be ruined." She looks at him from flat on her back.

"All are ruined," he corrects, a corner of his mouth turning into a grin. In the dark she can only feel it. "Very much ruined."

"I…"

"S'alright, love. I considered that earlier and decided the pros devastatingly slaughtered the cons."

Her protests weaken a great deal at that. "But, the places…it's the only…"

"There'll be others. We'll plot our own if need be. If you're done fussing, highness."

She nods speechlessly, obediently, and he kisses her smile until it turns into a laugh and he can't hold her still. "I'll miss dinner," she complains, pressing a hand to her empty stomach.

Jack stops at that, and she imagines the demented cogs of his mind turning in the silence. Suddenly she's surrounded by cold and he's not with her any more. She sits up, trying not to sound anxious. "Jack?"

The room is flooded with light, forcing her to squint. His narrow, naked form is outlined in the open doorway. "Jack?"

She scrambles for something to cover herself with as he disappears into the corridor. A strange sort of nausea is building in her throat and she's ashamed to hear the quiver in her voice as she calls for him again and again. Her shirt and breeches are back on in a hurry and she's stumbling out of the room after him, between laughter and tears.

He's coming towards her with a Spanish salver, burdened with food still steaming and unprepared from the kitchens—chicken breast and bright red tomatoes and half a loaf of bread and one whole papaya and—she clutches the doorframe.

He stops to look her over and his brows draw together. "You're dressed," he points out, sounding disappointed.

"You're not," comes her incredulous reply.

"Well spotted," he agrees solemnly.

۞

The moon's waning in a dawn of cold purple when she leaves his cabin. The fresh dampness of the outside air makes her pause in drowsy surprise—there's been rain in the past few hours. In the glowing lamplight of the harbour, she sees her flagship, a neat little sloop, shining wet. Unwillingly her mind turns to business; fresh caulk and tar on deck before noon, to prevent water damage…perhaps they'll finally replacing the decaying halyards…

Her gaze moves from her own ship to another a few hundred yards away, anchored nearer to the concealed channel that leads to open sea. Its telltale black canvas is stowed, to her secret relief. Part of her expects to see it already in full sail and exiting the bay, with Jack waving a merry goodbye from the helm. But he's still in his cabin sleeping (if one could call his restless writhing and incessant muttering sleep), and there's no pair of hands on his crew yet sober enough to tell bow from stern.

When there is, she might then attempt to fathom an appropriate goodbye.

۞

Author's Note: Yes, I know. It has been an unprecedented amount of time since I last updated, and I am an awful, awful person for being so lazy. Any apology I can think of won't do the laziness justice, so I'll just hope for your kind forgiveness. Don't worry, there will be one more chapter, I wouldn't leave anyone with an ending like this; I'm not particularly happy with this chapter at all but the plumbing of my creative sensibility is all clogged up for some reason. I will honestly, with all my brain, try to make the final chapter better than than this one, and make it happen a bit quicker too.