The Silk of Benzaiten

Three

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Present Time

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He could see his father now: shaking his mother's shrunken head at him and wagging a bony finger at the Code. It was a damn large tome and Jack knew all of it by heart. Hell half of it had been inked on his back (just the bits he'd rather keep behind him) and there were all sorts of finicky rules about what to do in these sorts of situations.

He took a better look at the boy.

He didn't appear to have come away from Karasu as cleanly as he had first thought. Bottom line was that Karasu was a pirate. Jack shouldn't have been wincing the way he was. The crimson haired boy limped rather badly in a way he hadn't before, looked like he'd been run into a wall a few times and slashed up something chronic. His feet were covered with blood and dirt, shoeless as he was.

"Are you…you know, all right? You look like you went ten rounds with Anamaria." Half of the frequent slaps he received from the pirate…ess were nothing compared to her left hook. He'd been knocked out cold by her a few times, and he wasn't really all too ashamed to say so. Elizabeth, he'd bet, would hit just as hard these days. The force of the seas lay behind her punch, just like the current was in her hair and the ever changing temperament of the waves was in her eyes.

But Elizabeth was William's. And William was out frolicking about collecting dead men for the one day a year he could be in her arms on the shores. They both had big shoes to fill. Jack found himself with eternity to chase…or rather eternal youth.

Jack licked his lips and turned his mind back to the situation at hand. Fidgeting with his sleeves a little and the bits and pieces he'd tied around his wrists.

The boy's eyes opened again, their odd glow stark against the whiteness of his skin in the moonlight. The dark purple and green tinged blotches that littered his skin made Jack bite his lip, the boy was lucky to be alive after the beating he'd taken. "Who?"

Jack waved a hand a little faster than he had intended, as if he could brush away his own concerns. "Doesn't matter. Can you run?"

The boy looked off to the side bitterly. "I will be able to in a few days. I heal quickly."

"I'll believe that when I see it," he ground out, nodding his head to the side and swaying on the balls of his feet a bit. "That said I have seen some interesting things lately. Would you like to know about the time I was a corpse or the time I was eaten by leviathan?"

That earned him a scathing glare.

"Alright!" he whispered, his voice a little high. "Okay. Don't give me the evil eye. I believe we can help each other."

The boy staggered forward a few steps then reached out with a hand. His hand skimmed the thick bark of the tree, but he righted himself soon after and leant against it for a long moment. The tree itself must have been centuries old, Jack couldn't wrap his arms around it even if he tried. Strangely, the tree seemed to embrace the boy as much as the boy did.

Jack swept to his side, hovering and looking over his shoulders nervously. "I don't mean to sound like I'm rushing you...but there's a crazy pirate after us and you can barely even stand."

The boy gave him a scathing look once again. This time Jack recoiled a little and held his tongue.

He'd seen a lot of evil things in his life, hell he'd been the cause of most of them, but that glare held the depths of Hell within it. Or rather, the Hell that he had been dragged through while in captivity.

"I will manage."

Grinding his teeth and holding his ground as one of his little shoulder Jacks told him to do, he spoke in a harsh whisper, "Karasu won't sit around drinking tea and reading poetry. We need to go now, fix up what you need fixing up and then abandon ship—port...whatever. Now lean on me, or I'll knock you out and take me with you!"

The boy stared at him for a while and then closed his eyes.

Jack waited, twitching at every small sound about them. The wind hissed through the trees and pulled at his hair, making the little trinkets chime quietly. He twitched at that too, then swept his eyes upwards and grimaced.

Eventually the boy held an arm out.

With a grin wider than the situation granted, Jack looped the thin arm over his shoulder and wrapped his own around the boys waist to help support the boy. A cursory look around the forest reassured him a little before they left the darkness of the tree's moonlight shadow. He directed the boy off in whatever direction his feet took him in.

Compass be damned. All roads lead somewhere.

-

The door to the desolate hotel room swung open and black boots stepped inside. There was a distinct crunch with every step, the glass grinding under the soles of the intruder's boots.

The broken mirror cast shards of light all about the room, filling it with rainbow markings and odd patches of moonlight that reflected in the man's eyes. They narrowed on sighting the blood that littered the floor and dresser. The room, though the window was open, still smelt of sex, grime and dust. Blood overpowered it all.

The window to his right created a draft, carrying fresh air through to the door and causing ripples in the Hiei's weathered jacket.

"Gone," he muttered to himself.

His eyes flicked to the window and the trail of blood that lead over to it. Had Kurama dragged himself out of the window? It would explain the blood lingering on the glass and the red coloured light spilling about the room.

With bandaged fingers he reached up to his bandana and tugged until the knot came undone. He pulled it away from his forehead and wrapped the material around his unbound hand.

In the centre of his forehead, a slit opened. Sluggishly at first and then with urgency. It opened wide, displaying the large purple eye and stared straight ahead, out of the window towards the sea.

He's not here, he thought loudly, directing it to the one in the cave he had been guarding beforehand.

There was a subtle questioning prod. Slight whispers of questions, both unorganised and hectic. Hiei did his best to organise them into something he could understand enough to answer.

There's only a trail of blood and glass, but he was definitely here. He's moved since I last had the chance to watch him. Hiei smirked wickedly.

Another prod, only with more of a venomous tinge.

Hiei's expression returned to a blank and empty slate. If I find the pirate, I'll find Kurama.

Terse prodding that seared pain through Hiei's eyes and crawled into his skull. He frowned and clenched his fists.

He was here.

Silence.

Hiei grunted and all three of his eyes blinked once, the one in the centre of his forehead opening a little more lazily this time.

He sorted through scents and visuals, barraged with information that he didn't want or need. Just the fox. Just need to find the fox via the pirate.

North.

His third eye closed and Hiei gingerly replaced his bandana, trying it at the back of his head with a skill born of repetition. Then he brushed his dark hair away from his eyes and walked to the window.

Sea breeze greeted him, its salty fresh tang stinging his lips.

Looking down he could see the remainder of the window and more blood. Kurama seemed to have fallen from the second storey window and landed decidedly not on his feet. He narrowed his eyes, feeling his chest tighten.

He leapt from the window, the black leather of his jacket drifting after him.

-

"Don't tell me you've never commandeered a ship before?" Jack drawled, looking down blankly at the boy.

The red-head's lips pulled down and he fisted his hands in the shining emerald of his kimono, holding it up as he waded through the shallow water after Jack. They were making their way around the coastline towards an unmanned boat on the other side of the island. It wasn't large really, but it would do until they procured another ship. "I've stolen many things, but never a ship."

Jack hummed nonsensically.

The boy was able to walk now, though it was mostly a hobble accompanied with winces and shaking limbs. Jack still held him about the waist to keep him steady but otherwise he let the boy be. The thinness of the boys waist worried him. He'd bet he could count his ribs easily.

The sun was rising as the water rushed over their feet, taking their footprints with it.

"So what are you? A mermaid? I haven't met one of them yet. I'm still waiting," Jack rambled, taking a moment to yank his boot from the sand where his boot had sunken in with a small grunt. "I figure I'll meet one eventually."

The boy chuckled. "No. I am kitsune. A fox."

Jack waved a hand nonchalantly. "Fox. Fish. Nh."

There was silence for a long while after that. Jack had hit a nerve. Okay, he understood that.

Jack looked over his shoulder just to make sure no one was behind them then switched topics.

"Do you have a name, kitsune?"

Silence for a long time again, then came the quiet reply, "I go by Kurama these days."

Jack grinned. "Ah. Well, it's belated but I am Captain Jack Sparrow. How'd you run into Karasu? You two don't seem to be, erm, on the best of terms..." He waved a hand about, tightening his hold on Kurama when he stumbled. The boy grumbled, reluctant to accept Jack's help, but he nodded in thanks all the same.

Jack tried desperately to not notice how the sun filtered through a strand of Kurama's crimson hair that had fallen from its pins and coils and made it seem like fire as it caressed his neck. He'd been to Japan before. The women there were...alluring. Their long necks and humble, sweet natured personalities had been enticing. Their pink, delicate...

Jack turned his eyes back to the coast stretching out before them.

Kurama cleared his throat before speaking. "An Englishman bought me from a slave trader. En route to Port Royal the ship was attacked by pirates. They killed everyone, but when Karasu came below deck to the brig...he spared me. Kept me as a bed warmer instead. I thought I couldn't afford to bring down the Toguro Brothers' wrath if I disobeyed or killed Karasu..."

Jack turned his head to look down at the boy. He'd turned away, but Jack could sense the bitterness leaking from the boy. It was like a black cloud, nigh tangible. Like sludge on his skin. Jack...felt sorry for the boy.

"I cannot die in disgrace like this."

Jack clicked his tongue and turned his eyes to the hull of the approaching ship. "In my experience, it's not good to die at all. That said, living the life of the dead isn't all that bad either."

It might have been his imagination, but Jack swore he heard the boy chuckle weakly.

Jack sighed. "Let's commandeer this ship and put as much distance between Karasu and ourselves as possible."

-

The act of acquiring a fully maned ship is...surprisingly easy, as long as you have Captain Jack Sparrow with you.

Reputation alone is enough to have most of the crew terrified of him, it seems.

Three ships later, they'd procured themselves a merchant ship that was sympathetic to pirates, nigh turning pirate themselves in the days of bad business.

Kurama thought it amusing, through the fog of pain that riddled his mind and body. As soon as he found a moment to, he slunk into the shadows and slid into the darkness of the cabins below. Hiding beneath the stairs that lead to the crew's quarters might not have been the best place to lick his wounds, but it was the best place for the moment, with the crew on deck scampering about following Jack's barked orders like loyal dogs that had worked under him for years. The man had a strange charisma about him that enabled him to do such things.

The first thing Kurama did was tear his kimono off himself and rummage around the crews cabins for clothing and something to tie his hair back with. Wandering about in a ship's hull that swayed back and forth with the ebb and flow of the waves was a little difficult on his weakened body, starved for the most part and in dire need of proper rest and recuperation, but he managed.

It took him a while, going through all of the chests and piles under the hammocks and cots with slow efficiency. Once he'd collected himself a pile of wearable clothes in what he figured to be his size he set upon pulling them on. Gooseflesh crawled across his skin, bringing his attention to the dark swells on his arms and hips, between his legs and thighs. He spared a moment to frown and then hurried on with dressing himself.

He worked a loose poet's shirt over his head and pulled on some breeches after, tucking the shirt into the breeches whilst he was at it. A long sash around his waist to hold his breeches in place and a leather jerkin came next. He took a baldric while he was at it, just in case. Without his star ball, he was as good as weapon less.

He caught himself pining for a mirror out of curiosity, but the thought was quickly dismissed and a hand flew to his temple. The shards of the mirror that Kurama had rammed him into repeatedly had been mostly removed, but he was sure there was still some that had been assimilated into his skin as it had healed.

He sighed heavily and returned to the dark corner under the stairs, leaving his torn and bloody kimono in the centre of the cabin. It was soaked with water and smelt of sea, sweat, sex and blood. He had no desire to touch it again.

Sitting on a wooden crate and pressing his back into the hard wooden wall, Kurama drew his knees up to his chest simply thought. One could call it meditating, were it not for his tense manner and the way his eyes tended to dart up to the stairs at every creak of the ship and the wooden stairs.

That was how Jack found him.

Stumbling down the stairs and swinging around to face Kurama. The pirate's seemingly instinctive knowledge of where his hiding place seemed to be was curious. Jack thrust a pair of high boots at Kurama abruptly without saying anything. Eager to please, unaware of the danger that lurked in Kurama's troubled though healing mind.

Kurama took them in silence, and tracked Jack with his eyes as he wandered around the cabin, peaking here and there. Finally he came upon the kimono and fisted a hand in it, bundling the sopping mass into a ball and holding it in one hand by his thigh. He seemed to be searching for words, staring at the floor.

"I've never really had to help a man recover from the kinds of things you've been through. If you had lost an eye or a leg, I'd know exactly what to do, but you've lost something else entirely. And don't lie to me, I know what he's done... Caring's never been one of my strong points..." Jack murmured, looking at Kurama's bare feet, the newly red patches of scar tissue from the glass he'd trod on trying to escape Karasu's rape littered them like the markings of a tiger.

Kurama only stared silently, his fingers tightening in the dark leather of the worn but decent boots.

"I know what it's like to lose freedom. That's why I'm a pirate. I chase horizons, and loot. I do so honestly and fairly. Karasu...well he's not a pirate. He's not even fit to be called a man."

With a decisive nod and avoiding Kurama's gaze, Jack left Kurama. With his keen hearing, Kurama could hear him issuing orders that no one was to disturb him under any circumstances until Kurama himself had risen from the cabin himself.

He'd taken the kimono with him.

-

The sky was dark by the time Kurama climbed the stairs to the deck. The crew was still rushing about here and there, but it was a calm windless night and there were no clouds or land in sight. The crew moved with a calm ease, performing their tasks untiringly and happily. On the deck, at the aft, there was a boy who couldn't be older than fifteen, scrubbing the wood lovingly.

He kept his head down as Kurama approached him. "Where is Captain Jack?"

Now the boy did look up. He took Kurama in for a moment, and then mild surprise washed over his features. "I thought you was a lady."

Kurama allowed himself to be amused. He had been wearing a kimono before and he supposed it had been Karasu's intention from the beginning to embarrass him by creating situations like this. Though his male pride demanded his hackles rise, he remained calm through the many other emotions his mind seem to think he out to be feeling. Emotions were second par to survival, after all.

"I am not. Is this a problem?"

The boy dropped the brush back into the wooden pail by his knees and sat back on his heels. "No sir. Cap'n Jack you said?"

"Yes. Where is he?"

"Cap'ns cabin. Below deck on the port side of the aft...er, left side at the back." He scratched the back of his head, ruffling short greasy hair as he did so.

"Thank you." Kurama had been about to leave, but he paused and looked back down at the boy who was still watching him with deceptively intelligent eyes. "What's your name?"

"Don't got one. The men call me Finney though. Suppose it's short fer Phineas or somth'n." He shrugged a shoulder and pushed his dirty shirt back over his shoulder when it slid down.

"I am Kurama."

Suddenly feeling tired, Kurama swivelled on his heel and made his way for the Captain's cabin, leaving Finney to stare after him. He could still feel his eyes on him even as he descended the steps to the cabin which seemed to be much larger and eloquent than the crew's cabins.

He didn't knock; he figured Jack would have heard the loud thud of his booted feet on the wooden steps long before he'd made it to the door.

Jack was sitting on the bed, his jacket tossed over the wooden chair by the bed and his boots beneath the chair itself.

Kurama turned to close the door quietly and slipped his baldric over his shoulder, he placed it by the door.

"You know, you don't look so bad dressed in pirate getup like that. The black suits you. Least it's black now, I think the breeches were once white..." Jack mumbled into his bottle of rum arching an eyebrow at the wall.

"Western clothing is strange." Kurama sat on the rather large bed beside Jack, an actual one, not like the cots and hammocks that decorated the close quarters of the crew's cabins. The sheets were dusty and stained with what looked like wine, but Kurama was used to living in grime and dirt after these past few years and the turn of events within them.

He rested against the wall beside Jack and took the bottle from him when it was offered. He barely held back the cough that threatened to rise after he'd taken a gulp. He could not keep the look of pain and distaste from appearing however. "Urgh."

"Aye, It's been a while since I visited China or the like," Jack said, as if he knew the strangeness that came with wearing clothes of a different cut and culture.

They were silent for a long while, and Kurama rested his head back on the wall, allowing himself to relax momentarily. The ship barely even rocked now, the weather had calmed considerably since his first venture below deck in the afternoon.

"Where are we headed Jack?"

"That's Captain Jack, foxie. And we're headed for...well I'm not sure. We'll figure it out in the morning. I have no magical hiding places. Maybe we'll stop at a sandbar somewhere and rest the men up and hide from Karasu at the same time."

Kurama looked at him, frowning as he did so. "I can't do that, Jack. Captain Jack. I have to find my star ball."

Jack turned his head to peer at him curiously. The darkness around his eyes seemed, if possible, even darker in the candlelit darkness of the cabin. "And where is that?"

"...I don't know. I have always felt that it would find me, in a sense."

Jack tipped his head back and narrowed his eyes at Kurama, then poked him with a finger. "You have no desire to find it?"

"Of course I do!"

Jack grunted and shifted around for a moment, lifting his hips and tugging at a string that was attached to his belt. After a moment he loped a black box at Kurama, who caught it easily. When he opened it he found himself staring at a golden compass that pointed Northwest by north.

"That'll give us directions, you just have to give me the bearings, foxie. We'll hoist the anchor in the morning. Now, rest and stop bearing your teeth, it creeps me out. There's no Karasu here."

Kurama stared at the compass a moment longer, confusion evident. "Which north does this point to?"

"Ay?"

"Stellar or true north? From your confidence I assume it's not broken."

Jack smirked and settled down a little, sliding down the bed until his back was level with the bed and only his head was bent to lean against the wall. "It points in whatever direction you want it to point in," he said quite happily.

Kurama blinked. "Desire? It runs on desire?"

"Aye, it does. Calypso, I guess you could call her the goddess of the sea, gave it to me a while ago."

Silence reigned for a long time. Kurama thought quickly, running through plans and counter plans. Possibilities and probabilities. Jack drunk happily, content with whatever thoughts were running through his own head.

Kurama wrenched one of Jack's hands away from his rum and placed the compass within it. From its direction pointing away from Kurama it swivelled almost immediately in the opposite direction to face Kurama, then stayed as such when Kurama turned the box slightly.

Kurama frowned. He tied the string attached to the compass to his sash and snapped the box closed loudly, then slid to the edge of the bed.

"It's no secret I suppose," Jack said.

"No," Kurama said, "no secret. It's been in your eyes from the beginning; a desire to manipulate as well as take."

"Now I wouldn't call it manipulating..."

Staring forward, eyes hard, Kurama's hands fisted in the dusty sheets of the bed. "You want the Silk of Benzaiten, assuming you've heard of it. You think I know where it is, because I'm kitsune. You intend to get into my favour and persuade me to help you find it."

"...I'm not going to lie to you, if that's what you want. And, aye, I've heard some things about it."

Kurama sighed and let his chin drop to his chest. His hair fell to cover his eyes. A sudden wave of utter exhaustion crept over him.

Jack shifted beside him, rearranging himself on the bed. He even went so far as to place his nigh empty bottle on the chair beside the bed before he sat up and wrapped an arm around Kurama's chest, guiding him to lay back on the bed beside him.

He did as Jack wordlessly asked and lay beside him for the night. Jack himself merely slept like the dead for the entire night, though he tended to mutter nonsense phrases and jerk a little in his sleep. The only point of contact between them was their arms brushing against one another until Kurama rolled over onto his side, facing away from the strange pirate who intended to use him for his own gain selfishly. Yet he was helping him too. Kurama should not have been so annoyed. It was a mutual trade agreement really, and Jack had no real reason to help Kurama out.

It was a long time before sleep claimed him, giving him relief from the spikes of pain that spiralled through his system.