fic - bearding the loa, chapter 2

[anyofmanynames]

Title:  Bearding the Loa
Chapter:  Riding
Pairing:  J/E, eventually, plus others
Rating:  R
Summary:   Speaking with the spirit realm, shipboard politics, and what's become of Davy Jones...


The next time Gibbs asked Tia Dalma for a heading, they were making their way out of Tortuga Bay, and she told him to steer for the Atlantic - "dat will mos’ likely start us right."

Barbossa’s scowl was darker than his first mate’s, and Elizabeth, with her eyes fixed on the setting sun but her ears straining toward the helm, heard snippets of "…-ll very well, playin’ at mysteries…swamp…run fer provisions, but headin’ out…ocean, someone’s got t’ command this…have t’ give a me what I need t’…-n’t be stood up for a fool front o’…"

Elizabeth’s hands tightened on the rail. Barbossa and Tia united were one problem; the captain and the conjuror at odds were two. She shifted a few feet along the rail to catch the next words more clearly.

"The time we need’s gone past now. It don’ mean I know where we sail, but it mean we c’n find out. Make for the ocean; we begin tonight."

At least Tia hadn’t seen fit to antagonize him. Her voice had been unusually unaffected, and measured against most of her words those has been quite informative. Elizabeth’s eyes followed two gulls swooping through the crimson cloudbanks as she pondered. In some ways it was lucky Tia seemed to be truly as clever and far ahead of them all as she claimed. She could keep her own peace, probably.

Heavy footfalls sounded behind her and stopped directly to her right. "Aye, ye’d best look your last while ye can. A matter of days and we’ll not be seeing that sight again fer some time."

"What, the sunset?"

"The Caribbean, lass."

"Unless Tia Dalma gives us word that we’re to turn around tomorrow." Elizabeth shrugged carelessly, and Barbossa scowled.

"Ye’d best hope she does - the sea ain’t no more gentle t’ fine ladies than common men. Less maybe, and a long ocean passage…"

"Of course I do hope for a short passage insofar as it will allow us to regain our proper captain more quickly."

Barbossa snorted. "Your captain, is he?"

"That should be obvious."

"Oh, it is, lass, it is."

Elizabeth’s voice was frost in the warm evening. "Is there a purpose to this interview, Captain?"

"Only sharin’ a few friendly observations."

"They’re noted as they deserve," she replied, staring quite as firmly as she could across the water.

Barbossa chuckled and left her. The sun carried on setting.

* * *

"Ya all knows it’s time we be gettin’ on our way now," Tia declared when she had everyone gathered amidships that night. "An since we go where Jack’s gone, we got t’ find where dat is. Very soon, I’s gonna ask ‘im."

"Dead men tell no tales," squawked Cotton’s parrot. Tia glared at it.

"Dis ain’t somet’in’ dat’ll work for me t’ do alone, an’ it won’ work wid useless men gettin’ underfoot. So dis is how it’s gonna be. Any dat wan’ t’ help wid dis t’ing is welcome. An’ any dat don’ needs t’ clear off. You decide now. Captain, I’s sorry, but yo’ help is mos’ especially required."

"Who’s Jack?" one of the new Tortuga hands whispered too loudly.

"Our Cap’n before this’n. Good man. Dead now, like the bird said," Pintel replied.

The man that did the asking shuddered as the night wind gusted across the deck, and to a man, the new hands chose to withdraw. A few scampered off casting anxious glances at the water as if trying to judge whether they’d come too far a distance now to jump over the rail and swim for shore. Some disappeared below decks, crossing themselves as they went. A few volunteered to take over the current watch and managed to find duties that gave them a clear line of sight to spy on the strange goings on, on the main deck. And most didn’t bother with that pretense, just clustered on the forecastle steps and settled in to watch.

Also to a man, those who’d sailed on The Pearl remained, though Gibbs looked pale, and the parrot seemed disgusted with the whole thing. "A fool’s errand in a foul wind!" it screeched, and Cotton shrugged sheepishly and poked the bird, presumably to bolster its faith.

Tia’s islanders appeared then, bearing small drums for themselves and what wine casks had been emptied during the sail to Tortuga for the others. They handed off a few of the casks and broke down a couple more, passing out the iron hoops freed from the ends along with heavy spoons from the galley. When everyone had something to beat on, the islanders began teaching the pirates to drum.

* * *

There was grumbling among the Tortuga men that night. Elizabeth heard it on every side as she made her way aft to her cabin.

"Ship’s bound straight t’ hell, ye mark my words."

"No argument from me, mate," sounded from the pair at the rail.

"…and deliver us from evil. For Thine are the kingdom, the power, and the glory…" from the lone fellow perched atop the capstan.

And the knot of grimy men clogging the companionway were in the middle of a grand complaint as she jostled her way through them.

"Dodgy business, if y’ask me."

"Well, ye’re a gen’rous chap! I calls it plain insane."

"Never any good comes o’ gettin’ mixed up wit’ the supernat’ral. Probably there’s a curse. There always ends up bein’ a curse. An’ there’s a witch aboard. Didn’t nobody tell us about her when we was signin’ up."

"Didn’t nobody tell us nothin’. I thought we’d be sailin’ after some lovely gold and jewels."

"They didn’t say we would."

"Well, I didn’t bloody well think I needed t’ ask! What chap in ‘is right mind thinks t’ ask, ‘So which’re we after this trip - plunder ‘r dead men?’"

All of it throbbed along with the drums still echoing in her head in a perfectly sickening way. And that was only what she overheard. The men from the companionway trailed along after her, and what they said to her was another matter again.

"Not in there, sweeting." The broad-shouldered one with the bristly black beard leaned against her cabin door. "Come below, welcome a few lonely hands aboard."

She regarded him levelly. "Thank you, no."

"Don’t be cold, lass. Take pity on poor sailor, settin’ out on queer voyage and pinin’ fer fair ports left behind." This was the one who was missing most of one ear.

"You’re warm enough from the last bed you left in Tortuga. Good night."

"Aww, now we promise t’ be good company. Real friendly," and the one who was far too young for this sort of thing splayed a hand over her hip and made to drag her back against him. She whirled on him, and Big-and-Bristly grabbed her wrist. Her knife was in her other hand though, and she threw her shoulders back against the wall to have none of them behind her.

"Now that ain’t friendly a’tall." Bristly reached to take the knife, the blade twisted toward his wrist, and the youngin’ let out a yelp, though it wasn’t his blood that spilled. Bristly cursed and released Elizabeth’s wrist to clutch his own.

"And your behavior is hardly polite. Good night." She wrenched open the cabin door behind her, slipped through, and slammed it again. In the tiny cupboard’s worth of space, she glared at the bar inside the door, resenting the fact that she had to be glad it was there.

Will came to her a few minutes later. What had delayed him on deck was a mystery - no, not a mystery, it was nothing. They’d merely stepped apart, seeing no reason not to. "Elizabeth, why is the door barred?"

"To exclude unwanted company."

"Ohh…"

The door flew open. "Oh, Will, not you - I’m sorry!" She looked a bit wild, and she wrapped her arms around him and clung. Lightly, he stroked her back.

"Elizabeth, are you all right?"

"I…yes. Yes, I’m fine. Just very, very tired."

"It has been quite a day. I’ll…leave you to your rest, then?"

She jerked back a bit, surprised. "You needn’t…"

Will smiled a regretful half-smile. "You look fit to topple, Elizabeth. Good night." He brushed a kiss across her cheek and vanished into his own cabin just across the passage.

Elizabeth closed her door. And barred it.

* * *

Barbossa was passing when she stepped out of her cabin the next morning. "An’ how’re ye findin’ the hospitality of me crew, Miss Swann?"

"I find it leaves something to be desired."

"I expect they’d make nigh the same complaint about you, missy - that ye’ve left ‘em desirin’ something.’"

"I don’t need you to interpret their depravity to me."

"No, since I put ye off on that island with Jack, I’m sure ye don’t."

"You speak with a great deal of assurance about things you know absolutely nothing of."

"Ah, come now. Ol’ Jack must’ve made a rare fine job of it - it’s stark ‘n’ clear t’ all that’ll look how keen ye are to save the man what ruined yer wedding."

"Cutler Beckett ruined my wedding, Captain."

"Ye’ll be wantin’ to watch that tone, sailor."

"Tone?" she inquired without the slightest confusion.

"Aye, an’ ye’ll also be wantin’ t’ get yerself forward and shimmy up that mast there." He nodded toward the bow and strode off shouting, "Set stuns’ls, lads, and let’s catch the backs o’ these trades!"

Fifteen minutes later, as she and Will wrestled the canvas into place on the top stuns’l boom he called up, more than loud enough for the entire crew to hear, "Swann, ye daft chit, what kind o’ shoddy work is that?"

"Bastard," she growled. Will’s eyes went round. "He is," she insisted.

* * *

If First Mate Gibbs knew one thing, it was that in between the bits when you stared death in face, life on a ship - any ship, even the strangest - was nothing if not routine. The next few days on The Burgundy fell into a pattern as is of their own accord. There was the cycle of assigned watches,fours hours on and eight off - four hours of hard labor by day or deathly dull watching at night, eight hours of exhausted sleep or struggling to fill the hours with boozing and betting and tale-telling. Will and Miss Elizabeth shared watches, so it was also four hours of the captain railing and cursing and eight hours of blessed peace.

If there was one thing Gibbs didn’t know, it was what those two had done to earn Barbossa’s particular grudge against them when the rest of Jack’s crew had escaped it, but he winced for them whenever he heard the captain shout. Not that they did anything to make it easier on themselves. When Barbossa ranted at Elizabeth for her feminine weakness and her empty woman’s head, she wrapped herself up in a prim, grimsilence and glared. When he corrected the simple gaffs any new sailor would make, she would nod sullenly and ease the line or retie the knot. Bad practice not to acknowledge an order aloud - served everyone poorly come combat or foul weather when a captain couldn’t be looking to see all was done as he said.Gibbs didn’t remember the lass being so careless or unlearned those few days she’d sailed with The Pearl, and earlier when they’d both been against The Pearl in The Interceptor, she’d even seemed a bit of a naval tactician. He reckoned Barbossa made her nervous. He might do anyone.

And her laddy love - he took to Barbossa’s taunting with as much restraint as he did anything. The first time the man had sneered that Will for disgraced his father’s pirate blood, speculating - odd accusation, Gibbs’d thought, for hadn’t the Aztec gold proved some point about it? - as to his mother’s fidelity, it’d taken himself and that new hand Flanagan to hold the boy back. He’d been shouting and threatening like he feared the words were true, or as if a blacksmith-pirate had a lord’s honor to defend. Ungodly scene - Barbossa’d threatened the brig.

There was drumming practice in the evenings for The Pearl’s crew. The rhythms built themselves up, getting more and more complicated by the day. There got to be more of them, too - softer, louder, faster, and slower ones - and the witch said they’d need them all. She didn’t teach, left that to her underlings, but she swept about from group to group, looking fearsome and feral with her black lips split over black teeth warning that come the ceremony the least, littlest mistake could get their souls sucked out "right t’rough the sockets o’ yo’ eyes." Then afterwards, as they were packing their makeshift instruments away, she would slump against the mast and chuckle, tossing winks at a man or two. The first mate wasn’t sure how heathens and devil-worshipers raised their young, but he was fair sure that one hadn’t been slapped enough as a child.

And always, always there was that bit of tension with the new crewmen to worry over. They didn’t understand much of anything, those lads. Not why they were wasting time with drumming instead of steering straight into a trade route and hunting for swag. And certainly not why there should be two women on board and no advantage to them. Well, Tia Dalma wasn’t of so much interest being spookier than a six-legged flying cat, but Miss Elizabeth - she might be more scrap than morsel, that one, but she was a comely scrap, and he could see how men that didn’t remember her at the age of 12 might get ideas. And some that did, if you counted the absent former commodore.

He and the original crew banded together to guard her virtue so much as they could - which seemed to frankly surprise Elizabeth - but that was giving the impression there was some exclusive club formed around privileges with the ship’s lady. He’d gotten more than one inquiry as to how to join. Young Will could have fixed things if he’d gone about right, but so far he’d no more than confused the new men. Oh, he was quick to leap to her defense, all right, but it always sounded like he was calling the man out to duel for fair lady’s honor. These salts couldn’t read the books such tales came out of, and some had never learned more than a bawdy ballad from their own mothers. They would have understood him roaring, "The wench is mine!" and dragging her below for a spot of territorial staking perfectly, but if such a thing had even occurred to Will he must have realized his lady would have either laughed him down or slapped him. It all ended up with Miss Elizabeth pulling her sword quite often each day, as a point of steel was harder to argue than a point made of words.

Gibbs also knew that ‘routine’ didn’t mean any less of a mess.

* * *

"I been readin’ the Bible…"

"No, he ‘asn’t."

"I been lookin’ at a Bible, an’ thinkin’ ‘bout what the preacher used t’ say when I was a lad…"

Tia Dalma was hanging a straw bag filled with peanuts and a bottle of rum on the foremast. She looped the bag’s straps once more over a lantern hook and turned to her vistors. "Yes?"

"Well, the Bible only ever says there’s one heaven an’ one hell, so ain’t we just wastin’ a lot o’ time with this?"

She caught up a bowl of some paste and crouched to the deck. "Yo’ Bible say too dat Jesus called Lazarus out o’ the tomb - ‘Hello, dere. Get up now!’ - but we’s not doin’ t’ings dat way."

"But we know where he’s going, right?"

"A man like Jack? Lived his whole life touchin’ the fantastic? T’ink he’s gon’ go where the Church o’ England tell ‘im when he die?"

"Well, he wouldn’t seem t’ fit…"

"Ya see."

"Look, all I’m sayin’ is that the Bible don’t seem t’ think too much o’ this magic and witches and spirits business, an’ the Bible’s The Word, like, so how’s this ever gonna work?"

"Is dat not your cross, dere?" Tia gestured up at the mast above them, lifting its yards into the sky like the rungs of a mighty ladder. "An’ on the cross did yo’ Christ not pass over from the living to the dead? An’ at the crossroads, I tell ya, Legba open the paths between the worl’s. An’ is not yo’ cross here," she waved her hand over the intricate picture she painting on the deck with the paste - tar and cornmeal - "crownin’ the tomb, markin’ out where the dead come t’ rest?"

"I don’t like talking to her," Ragetti sulked as they wandered off again. "‘S no fun when they knows everything."

Pintel harrumphed smugly. "Told ya it wouldn’t do no good."

* * *

It was full dark, or as dark as the night could get between the white glare of the moon and the shimmer of her twin in the water when Tia called them all together for something that would not be practice. A wide ring of lanterns enclosed the foredeck, casting up a wall of light to shut out the world - a wall the salt wind and the soughing rigging utterly ignored, their wet breath and creaking moans ghosting through the circle. Just inside the ring the neat little hand drums sat with the tubby casks, and the foremast rose towering at the center of everything, its shaft swathed in red and white fabric, purple and black hanging from the lowest yard.

Tia stepped away from the foot of the mast with a rattle in her hand, and what light there was bent toward her, moon silver and lantern gold. "You dere, and jus’ wait," she murmured to Barbossa. He took up grudging position to side of the mast. She waved the sailors toward their instruments. "Now you play - softly, like you learned."

The Domingans began immediately, tapping a gentle counterpoint to the waves that slapped the ship’s sides. Tentatively, the pirates joined them, and to a soft, many-voiced pulse, Tia shuffled round to face the mast and began to hum. The humming slowly articulated into words, an endless litany of names that thickened in the air and left her listeners unsure whether they were feeling bored or entranced.

At last Bandele, one of the two she called hounsi, took the lead, skittered his fingers in a new rhythm, and cued the accompaniment that had been so carefully taught. Now the drum song was quiet still but shot through with an eager tension. Tia’s rattle draped in its jacket of beads rustled by her side. Her arms shot up above her head. "Papa Legba! St. Pierre!" she called out. "Attibon Legba, entendez-moi!" Her arms dropped, and her foot stomped. Then she was dancing, churning and stamping round the foremast and singing out a chant in a language that troubled Elizabeth’s mind by hinting just strongly enough at French to make it infuriating that it was not. The islanders, of course weren’t at all mystified; they sang back ‘ouvri baye’ and ‘nan baye-a’ every time Tia drew breath.

Suddenly a crackle of clear light limned the mast from crow’s nest to fiferail, St. Elmo’s fire wilder and hungrier than any storm ever made. It was gone so quickly nothing but the glowing afterimages behind their eyelids assured the assembly it had been at all, and yet the entire feeling of the night had changed. It was as if the unbounded waters stretching out in every direction to the horizon’s ring had, without their realizing it, been horribly narrow, and it was only now the space widened, doors opened, that they…that someone…that things could move. Tia kept dancing as she saluted the mast and beckoned Hounsi Santos forward to place a bowl filled with grilled chicken and yams at its foot.

Bandele thumped his drum then, and the beat changed again to something frenzied and joyous. Even as they scrabble to keep up, the pirates felt the rhythm stealing into them through skin to sinew, bone, and deepest core. One by one the islanders left their drums and joined the dance. It was impossible not to watch - the way the dancers gestured and the way their bodies met and parted - it wasn’t meant to leave anyone guessing. Will blushed, and Elizabeth’s eyes widened in horrified fascination. And the sailors - they’d paid good money for far less adventurous, thought statistically more female, shows in many a Tortuga brothel. And the beat carried all. Left to play alone, The Pearl’s crew drummed as if inspired; it was easier to drum than to stop.

A stranger thing happened then than any of them had ever expected to see - Barbossa leapt into the dance, stepping larger and higher and more lithely than any of Tia’s young acolytes. His limbs moved with a grace that was the opposite of boneless, as if flesh were naught but bulk and hindrance; the lantern light touched him just so and showed him pale as if the curse were upon him again; and where his shadow fell it was thinner than science allowed. He turned and surged as he stripped his coat and the baldric with its heavy accoutrements from his shoulders, and he laughed a laugh that was full and smoke-rough in place of his usual sly and gravelly one.

"Don’ you let me go dry, chile!" he shouted in an accent Hector Barbossa would have been disinclined to acquiesce to allow through his lips were he in his right mind or, indeed, in his mind at all. An imperious gesture to one of the dancers sent the man rushing to the edge of the circle and returning with a bottle of the peppered rum Tia had made clear was not for mortals. Barbossa snatched it from his hand and poured half the liquid down his throat. He splashed more on his head as he danced, rubbing the fiery stuff over his face with glee, and he held the bottle between his legs jerking it obscenely so the dregs spurted onto Tia’s skirts. Laughing again, he threw the bottle away and grabbed Tia instead, lifting her to straddle his hips and rocking her there as he completed a few more turns around the mast.

A wave of his hand and somehow the pirates knew it was time to soften the drums again to no more than a heart’s pulse. Barbossa set Tia down and stepped back with a leer. "Tia Dalma. Who died an’ left yo’ cunny so lonely you got t’ call on the Baron?"

"Ya know who I wan’ t’ speak wid, Baron."

"Mah power don’ stretch where he be, cherie," chuckled the dubious nobleman who was not Barbossa. "Bettah t’ fuhget ‘im. You nevah was one t’ set much store by one man, an’ while you’s livin’ ya wan’ to sport wid the livin’. Deir bits is warmer."

"Ya got mo’ power dan you’s lettin’ on. Ya know who’s keepin’ ‘im. You’s got power dat dey’ll hear ya speak."

"He ain’t in mah realm, an’ ‘is soul ain’t formed in the right parts. You know bettah dan dis."

"I do know, but I know too dat it can be done. Ain’t I right?"

"You ain’t got no more humble, I see."

"Don’ you be too humble. You can do dis t’ing."

"But why should I? What you pay me t’ scratch such an unnatural itch fo’ ya?"

"Don’t we feed ya well? Give ya a hoss ya know?"

The Baron glanced down at Barbossa’s body and back to Tia, unimpressed. "Give me back a hoss you stole, is mo’ like. An’ I’m out o’ rum." Santos hurried forward with another bottle. "I’ll be wantin’ a sacrifice. An’ no stringy chickens, all feathers, no stuffin.’"

"’Course not. We’s got a goat."

The Baron cocked his head, interest piqued. "Stud goat? Good horny goat?"

"See fo’ yo’self."

Santos came forward again, now leading the ship’s prize bit of livestock. The Baron considered the animal for a moment, then ambled off around the circle swigging thoughtfully from his bottle of fire. Drawing level with Ragetti rubbing his wooden eye, he murmured almost absently, "You’ll get mo’ pleasure stickin’ dat in another hole," and stopping in front of Will and Elizabeth he seemed to be swimming up out of a reverie. He regarded the two keenly, though, and chuckled. "Word o’ advice, boy," he said, leaning toward Will’s ear, "dat lady don’ wan’ no eunuchs." He turned, leaving Will spluttering, and faced Tia.

"Ought t’ toss ya over dat rail as uppity as ya are an’ laugh t’ see the water not take ya. But Legba t’ink you’s funny, so he’ll open the gate fo’ ya. An’ ya meet my price, so I’ll call yo’ soul."

At that, with so little ceremony it left the pirates gaping, Santos held the goat and Bandele a bowl to catch the blood, and Tia drew a knife from her belt and opened its throat. When the creature had bled itself to stillness, the Baron approached and lifted the bowl. He swished the contents about and sniffed them as if judging a fine wine, swallowed a mouthful, and nodded. "Very good," he pronounced to Tia, and withdrew to lean against the mast.

A few moments of empty silence passed. "It’s done like ya asked," huffed the Baron impatiently.

"Jack Sparrow?" Tia eyed her two hounsis assessingly, but they merely dragged the goat’s carcass out of the way. "Jack!" Her eyes traveled moved over the small crowd strung along the edge of the circle. "Jack Sparrow don’ ya be a damn fool, an’ show yo’self if ya know what’s good for ya!"

"Tia, darling! I knew you’d miss me."

The voice was very nearly Jack’s, just a shade too high, and it came from the last place it should have.

"Jack Sparrow, what trouble you causin’ now?"

"That’s ‘Captain’ to you, Mambo. And to everyone else. Evenin’ gents. Mr. Turner. What’s this, Turner? No Elizabeth? You haven’t lost her, have you?"

"You’s a devil, Jack." Tia waved a hand at him meaningfully, and he looked down at himself. Elizabeth’s body had made its way into the center of the circle, hips forward, eyes heavy, and hands floating in no mere imitation of the captain.

"Well, that’s interesting. Sorry, love."

"What hoss you’s ridin’s o’ no consequence now. We’s other mattahs t’ discuss."

"I suppose." Elizabeth’s eyebrows climbed, and she smirked Jack’s smirk. "Though I always thought a bit o’ ridin’ between a man an’ a woman was o’ very delightful consequence."

"Elizabeth!" Will exclaimed and made to step into the circle.

"She ain’t here, Will Turner! Her ti’bonanj done flown."

"There ye see, mate, ‘s just a bit o’ friendly possession. She won’t remember a thing, ask Tia…actually, Tia, will she remember it? Because if so, I think it’d be awfully nice if you assisted me in making this remarkable manifestation as maximally memorable as may be for Miss Swann, savvy?"

Will maintained some restraint only by telling himself that under ordinary circumstances Elizabeth was as physically incapable of leering as Barbossa was of dancing. "I demand that you respect Elizabeth!" he choked out furiously. The grip Gibbs had on his arm was a very necessary anchor at that point.

"Oh, go stab a heart," Jack grumped. "Tia?"

"No, she won’ remember. An’ neither will you, dead man."

"What? ‘S awfully sad t’ get a holiday from damnation and not remember it."

"You’ll remember so long as you’s dead, but no more once we fetch ya back t’ life. Dat’s what we got t’ speak ‘bout, Jack. We’s comin’ t’ get ya."

His eyes narrowed warily, and that expression was so at home on Elizabeth’s face, the crew shivered. "What’ll that cost me? I’m all out o’ monkeys."

"Monkeys ain’t involved. We need t’ know where we call ya from. Where you at, Jack?"

Jack glared at her piercingly, but then sighed. "Oh, you know, awful fiery pit of lamentation," he replied, his voice turning fiercely nonchalant. "A bit common, really."

"But which one?"

"There’s more’n one?"

"O’ course, dere’s more dan one!" Tia snapped. "Which you in?"

"I hardly see I’m supposed to tell one inferno from the next when you only just told me that there is a next."

"Ya could describe it."

"Eh, lots o’ levels, sundry graphic and inquisitorial torments, chastisements, reprovals… Didn’t see any ‘abandon hope all ye…’ over the gate goin’ in though."

"How’d ya go in?"

"Oh! Rather unpleasant, that bit. Two huge beasties, heads like an ox an’ a horse, caught me floating around - I’m not sure where really - an’ hauled me in."

"In where?"

"Courtroom type place. I wasn’t in their books. That shook them up considerable."

"Weren’t ya now?"

"Shocking, I know. They should have heard of me."

"No, dat’s good. Who’s books were dey? Who’d ya meet?"

"Books belonged to the king."

"His name?"

Jack mumbled something entirely unintelligible, and Tia glared disapprovingly.

"If ya never managed a sober word in ya life, Jack Sparrow, I know you ya can in death. Ya ain’t had time yet t’ rob hell’s cellars."

The injured pout was entirely Jack’s, but it looked quite fetching on Elizabeth’s face. Will felt a sudden profound need for a wash. "I said, Yen Lo-Wang."

"Yama," Tia breathed and nodded. "All righ’, den, Jack, listen here. When we come, dere will be words t’ speak, t’ open the ways. Ya need t’ find dose words. Dey won’ mind ya knowin’ ‘cause nothin’ in no hell open from the inside. But we’s goin’ t’ speak wid you once more before we come, an’ den you’s got t’ have dose words fo’ me. Savvy?" she tacked on ironically.

He rolled his eyes. "O’ course, savvy."

"T’ank you, Jack. We’ll be dere t’ collect ya, soon’s we can.

"What? That’s it? You must have loads more questions or instructions or something! Really, I don’t need to be back in hell for…until you come t’ fetch me, practically. Just t’ get those words."

"Miss ‘Lisbeth need her body back, Jack."

"Hardly. She owes me anyway. And she doesn’t mind having me in her body, do you, love? No, Jack, I don’t mind at all. You go ahead and stay. There! You see!"

"That was the most grotesque thing I’ve ever seen," Will gagged.

"Cap’n, ye make a right unnatural woman."

Jack froze and turned such a haughty gaze down his nose that the expression almost looked like one of Elizabeth’s own. "Indeed, Mr. Pintel."

"Jack, ya ain’t foolin’ no one."

"Fine," he grumbled. "But hurry up and save me."

"Let her go, Jack."

"Yes, all right then. Adieu, gentlemen, my lady. This is the day you will always remember as the day you sent Captain Jack Sparrow back to hell."

Quite suddenly Elizabeth collapsed. Will shrugged off Gibb’s arm and ran forward, the older man only a step behind. The pirates clustered around Elizabeth, and the Domingans dove for their drums. Will cradled Elizabeth and shook her gently as a slow-and-getting-slower beat played. Tia turned to the mast calling a final salute. Elizabeth’s eyes creaked open. She frowned.

"Why am I on the deck?" Then with more alarm she demanded, "What happened? Is the ritual ruined?"

"The ritual’s over," Tia said above her.

"Over?"

"Ya won’ remember, but ya were mos’ helpful."

Elizabeth struggled to her feet, ignoring Will’s plea of ‘shh, lie still!’ "Where are we going then?"

A groan from beneath the mast interrupted them, and Tia hurried off to see to Barbossa. "Where are we going?" Elizabeth called after her.

The other woman gave quick orders to two of her people to carry the semi-conscious captain off to his cabin. "China!" she shouted back.

* * *

An hour later, Will and Elizabeth had returned to their comfortable spot on the poop deck. Elizabeth sat with a blanket around her shoulders and a slowly cooling mug of weak grog in her hand, as Will feared she might at any moment regress to Barbossa’s level of recovery from the ritual.

"It was…very disturbing - watching you out of your own control, watching you act just like Jack," Will concluded, when he’d told her all he could of the part of the night she didn’t remember.

"From what you said Tia said, it was Jack acting just like Jack in my body." Oh, hell, she was blaming Jack for that. Some lingering aftereffect. It wouldn’t have come out like that if she were really, fully herself. Will didn’t smirk, though. Of course he didn’t.

"I know he’s better than he seems, but he made you say terrible things."

"What?"

"You’re probably happier not knowing."

"Worse than Barbossa - or whoever that was - said?"

"Well, no, but they were about you."

"He would do that. Wretch. He’ll have to pay once he’s alive again." He met her wry hint of a smile with a solemn, deliberate gaze.

"Why would Jack’s spirit choose you?"

Peas in a pod, love. "Maybe because I was the last person off the Pearl, the last person with him before he died."

"Or it was love."

"What!?" She spluttered messily on a sip of her grog.

"Don’t worry about sparing me, Elizabeth."

"What do you mean?"

"I know…I know that you love him."

Elizabeth moved her lips in the shape of ‘what’ again, but only puff of breath emerged.

"It’s…all right," he mumbled, the words nearly sinking into wind.

She set her tankard aside and straightened up. "It absolutely is not! Does my fiancé care so little that I - apparently - love a another man?"

"I saw you, Elizabeth. The two of you, on The Pearl. When you…kissed him. He deserved that."

Elizabeth squeezed her eyes shut and clutched his hands as crushingly as she had that first night in Tia’s shack. "I dare say he did," she whispered.

"And so it’s not that I don’t care, Elizabeth - I do, so very much - but…I understand."

God, he was going make her explain, make her tell him something awful. But this was Will, and she wondered for a desperate second if another answer were possible. Of course not. A slowly in-drawn breath, and she opened her eyes. "That was ‘thank you,’ Will. He saved us all."

"I know, and you’d not thank a man with an empty kiss."

"It was Jack! He likes - liked - will like…To kiss him and mean something by it would be cruel. It’d scare him to death."

"He died for us. For you."

He died of me. "We can keep discussing this, Will. Or you can quit being daft."

"Daft?"

"You missed being my husband by one hour. Do you think that means nothing?" She stretched a hand to his cheek, leaned forward, and kissed him.

"You don’t love Jack?"

"Daft," she murmured against his lips.

"You love me?"

"That’s what I’m telling you."

"You’re not telling me; you’re kissing me."

"And what do you think that means?"

"I don’t know, you might be thanking me for something."

"If you’ll cease this ridiculous discussion, I will thank you for it."

"Elizabeth?"

"Look at you, Will, you’re the best man I’ve ever known. Of course, I love you."

They scrambled up so the deck bit into their knees and they could hold one another better. He rested his forehead against hers and stroked her hair. "I love you too."

"I’m glad. You know you needn’t be quite so gallant as to go giving me away left and right."

"I would prefer to keep you." His kiss was soft and slow. She parted her lips when he might have pulled back and drew him deeper. His hands drifted up to cup her face, thumbs gently stroking across her cheeks. Her hands ran down his back and tightened around fistfuls of his shirt.

* * *

It was a terrible moment when Elizabeth realized Barbossa was a good captain. It was the very next morning and he’d found his way out of his cabin, much recovered from his recent possession.

"Fine day t’ be getting properly underway," he boomed, and Barbossa in good spirits was enough to make anyone look again. "China, lads!" Good luck that. A richer land ye could imagine, full o’ silks ‘n’ spices and every other nation in the world shippin’ ther gold there to buy said silks ‘n’ spices - the more fools them, eh? An’ the whores - make a Tortuga wench seem decent, they do. Pintel! You recall that dancing girl in Singapore - the one ol’ Jack watched so close he leaned into a lamp and set his beard afire?"

"Heh, I surely do, Cap’n."

"It was a fine trick she could do with her…mmm…an’ her…ehhh." There were distinctly unsubtle hand gestures, and Pintel grinned foolishly.

"Oh, aye."

"So let’s not delay then; the Orient’s a-waitin’!" And the crew, obviously quite cheered by a speech in which the words ‘resurrection’ and ‘witchcraft’ had not featured once, leapt to trim the sails for a broader reach and a more southerly course.

Barbossa took the helm himself and caroled out orders all morning. They were smart, competent commands, and he didn’t even break to heckle her or Will. "Aye, captain," rebounded back from all quarters. She heard it from Gibbs and glared betrayal at the first mate.

It was true, but temporarily, and there were too few on The Burgundy who truly understood that. It wasn’t in the nature of common sea dogs to care who captained a vessel. So long as the man knew what he was about, steered them to profits, and didn’t make enemies, they’d never see a need for change. The new hands did not hate Barbossa, and worse, she realized, he’d give them no reason to.

* * *

The Auspico Regis was beyond doubt the finest ship James Norrington had ever seen. She was a towering three-decker fitted with more firepower than a galleon carried gold, but trim and powerful in all the ways a galleon wasn’t. Christened and launched that very year from the yards in Portsmouth, she was a ship of the line to put the rest of the line to shame, and as fondly as Norrington recalled The Dauntless, as proud as he’d been of her at the time, this beauty would have daunted her. Dauntless had been the head of an island fleet; The Regis was the flagship of an empire.

It was glorious watching her loom nearer as his gig cut across the harbor, the rocky St. Helena hills and the pier of rugged littleJamestown falling away astern. An enormous relief to be once more on the right side of the law, headed from a simple, successful mission back out to an assuredly hospitable sea.

The Jacob’s ladder fell over the side of The Regis, and he clambered up, his oarsmen following. "Welcome aboard, Admiral."

It was rear admiral, actually; Beckett couldn’t have flown utterly in the face of propriety and promoted a disgraced navy man to the absolute head of his fleet even if he’d wanted to. But rank was a tricky thing to former-commodore, former-pirate Norrington these days. So far as sensitive information and acquaintance with the long-term plans of the East India Trading Company went, he was literally oceans ahead of the landbound fleet admiral back in London. But at the same time there were moments - fleeting, occasional - when he wondered what a rank really meant when it wasn’t naval rank. It meant his bit of honor back, of course, and this splendid ship and all the ships under her within his command.

"Thank you, Hawkins," he nodded.

"All go well at the fort, sir?"

"The Governor, smart man, was a rather leery. He desired immensely to receive a scientific rationale for the new procedures. The colonel of the garrison, though, was of the useful frame of mind that orders deserve to be followed for their own sake. I believe the Dutch and the pirates both will soon find these waters a great deal less tempting."

"Very good, sir."

"Yes, it is." He smiled faintly back at the volcanic prick of land that represented such a vital supply point for East Indiamen. "Hawkins, I shall be in my cabin preparing Beckett’s report. Have the men make ready to sail with the evening tide. Also, send Lieutenant Chesterson to me at the earliest convenience."

"Of course. Any lanterns, sir?"

God, but it was something to have intelligent underlings. "The green, once we’re out of sight of land."

Hours later, Admiral Norrington rested behind his desk idly spinning the handsome globe mounted to the near corner. Beckett’s report sat neatly penned and neatly sealed in front of him, the correspondence he was entrusting to Chesterson had already been handed off along with precise orders regarding the man’s impending assignment, and he’d been out on deck earlier to supervise their departure and set their new course. Now, he simply waited.

Only briefly, as it turned out. His door was shoved inward without any knock sounding, and Davy Jones stumped squidily into his cabin. "What?" the captain demanded, huffing so his every tentacle quivered.

"So good of you to come," the admiral remarked drily.

"Good of you to command it; now what d’ye want?"

"I shall be needing you to carry this to Beckett." He passed the prepared report into Davy’s claw. "It states that the new order of things has been communicated to the administration of St. Helena. That means they’ll be on the lantern system now as well. You’ll need to set your lookout watching in this direction along with the rest. They’re a higher priority than Barbados, so answer any summons of equal urgency from this quarter first."

"Lovely, what else?"

"I want your report - have you managed yet to acquire any crewmen that don’t resemble horrors of the deep?"

"O’ course, new crew’s never hard to come by."

"Excellent. See that you keep hands aboard who do indeed have hands in place of fins. They will be essential in receiving dispatches from the various outposts."

"Am I free, as ye might call it, to go?"

"Only a few more matters. I shall require fair winds to the Cape as of…now."

"Giving the Gold Coast a miss, are ye?"

"Myself, yes. You’ll be transporting Chesterson there on my behalf."

"What?" Jones’s voice cracked like a sodden lash.

"It is desirable for The Regis’s tour to appear to other nations as a masterful and preternaturally fortunate progress to the Company’s holdings in the Orient rather than a confused meander among all the ports of the empire. It would also be ridiculous to set back the implementation of the communications system by such a measure."

"Why this Chesterson? Who’s he?"

"I certainly could not go myself. Confirmed sightings of me on opposite sides of the Atlantic on consecutive days? No, what we want is a suspicion of the supernatural without the evidence. Uncertainty is much more debilitating to the opposition and defies counterstrategies. Also Chesterson is an excellent lieutenant."

"He won’t blubber, will he?"

"No, I assure you he’s most adaptable."

"Anything else?"

"Had Beckett any messages for me when you spoke with him last?"

Norrington knew members of the squid family were said to be able to change color quite spectacularly, and Jones certainly proved it as he darkened and growled, "Only that ye’re to carry on, an’ expect further orders for the Cape when ye’re nearer. Hangin’s were up last week. Three pirate vessels taken, with most of the crews alive - at the time. What are my orders there?"

This was the eternal question with the captain, but though their reluctant ally might bear his servitude more easily if they allowed him wreak broad and messy destruction rather than carry mail, that would not be the most strategic use of his abilities. Norrington sighed. "As they ever are. If you encounter pirates directly in the line of your other duties or if one of the colonies signals for urgent assistance, you are to attack. Otherwise, report their locations as you discover them, and leave them to our ships above the surface." Jones was curling his tentacles and leaning in ready to argue. "Do collect Chesterson on your way out. He’ll be waiting at the taffrail."

Davy straightened up, huffing again. The admiral couldn’t see any obvious traces of whale about the former man, but he certainly sputtered and spouted as if he breathed through a blowhole. He spun about and stumped back toward the door. "I swear one day, boy…my locker has space aplenty…" Norrington heard him mutter before he was gone.

* * *

The Tortuga men had watched the ritual, of course, though they hadn’t participated. Hovering outside the wall of lantern light, they’d seen more than enough to pique their interest. The first inquiry as to where the captain had learned to dance had gotten young Sam his ear boxed, so now all questions centered on Jack. "Bit odd, isn’t he?" seemed to be the favorite. The Pearl’s crew always agreed quite merrily that "aye, Cap’n Jack, he was a rare sort," and even Barbossa chimed in occasionally with humorous tales of the years before the mutiny.

The captain didn’t seem to find any humor, though, in what he’d heard recounted of Tia’s ritual. Something about it seemed to powerfully offend him, in fact. The number of times since that he’d found excuse to sneer ‘just like Jack’ at Elizabeth or imply something improper about her relations with the late captain mounted beyond calculation, until Elizabeth finally snapped, "If you have something to say to Jack, Captain, you’ll simply have to wait until we have him back. I’m no more him than you are a god of death." It was annoying, but Will didn’t understand why Elizabeth was coming to look slightly panicked anytime someone mentioned Jack’s name.

That came clear, though, the day Braxton, the huge, bad-tempered and be-whiskered fellow demanded, more bluntly than most dared: "So why’re we goin’ to such trouble for a half-mad sodomite anyway?"

"He did give his life to save his crew," Elizabeth snapped out.

"A touchin’ display o’ loyalty, Miss Swann, fer a man what never gave ye more than lies ‘n’ peril." Barbossa leered at her. "‘Less there be somethin’ else he gave ye, that we don’t know about."

"Oh, I think we know!" the man called O’Roarke hollered, and the men laughed her down as Jack’s whore. Gibbs hastened to state that Jack’s madness was brilliance and that what sailor was without blame could cast stones about the other thing, but his words lost in the noise. Will tried speak on Elizabeth’s behalf, but they laughed at him too, called him cuckold before his wedding, and not even with pity, only derision. He couldn’t think about the scene without fury - and a bit of confusion. He supposed the men’s suspicion about Jack and their suspicion about Elizabeth were reconciled by fact that since the ritual at least have of them believed Elizabeth was secretly a man. Or perhaps suspicions didn’t need reconciling.

The very next evening, Barbossa’s cursed monkey swung itself chattering and screeching into the rigging just where Elizabeth was working. The captain wandered over and, inevitably, sneered. "Well, it’s lucky me little friend here has a clearer head than yers, Miss Swann. A bowline is completely different from a sheet bend, ye do realize?" She hissed under her breath and retied the knot. "Thinkin’ just like Jack, that goin’ t’ sea’s all a bit o’ romance, too many dreams t’ trouble yer mind with work." Will caught her glaring daggers at the captain’s back; he remembered twelve-year-old Elizabeth touring his own young self around the ship that had saved him, proudly naming every line, spar, and bit of brass or iron, teaching him the knots she’d pestered then-Lieutenant Norrington into teaching her, and he knew Barbossa had corrected what had never been a mistake.

"Try not t’ get us killed when we hit our first bit o’ weather," Flanagan hissed to her in passing. Will saw her ball up her fists and bite her lip, and then she marched over to him.

"Enough of this," she spat.

"Elizabeth, he’s a spiteful villain, and he hates us. What can you do?"

"Not, him the crew. I’ve had enough of his poisoning them against us, and their sneering and disdain."

"We can’t change that either."

"We can. We’re going to make friends," she said, in a tone that suggested making friends was a process in which the uncooperative were often grievously injured.

* * *

When they got off watch, she vanished and met him again at the min hatch armed with two mugfuls of rum. He caught her arm as she began to descend. "Elizabeth, these men tried to…"

"To force me, yes, I know. But we’re going to be on this ship with them for at least five months. We can’t have them hating us that long; they won’t listen to us that way. And besides, they’re less interested in me now that some of them have apparently decided I’m a man."

Will sighed and tried to pull a smile. "Who’d have ever expected Jack to be protecting your virtue, eh?"

"Oh, he might have done all right against other people."

"Others? You said…"

"That it meant nothing? It didn’t. But of course Jack was interested. I dare say the only women he was never the least interested in were his mother and the Tortuga girls who charged more than two bits."

"Elizabeth!"

"Think of it as getting into character," she replied and vanished down the stairway.

The crew deck was cramped and too low-ceilinged to walk upright. Will picked his way around the galley tables spanning its breadth, turning time and again to hold a swinging hammock aside for Elizabeth, who followed with the mugs. One of the far tables was crowded with men. A number of lanterns hung above their heads, thickening the air with smoke that was colorless but sharp to the eyes. They drew level with the table, and Will saw they were dicing. He winced at the rattle of the cups, but at least it coin changing hand here, not years. Elizabeth nudged him.

"Hello, lads." He slid warily onto a spare bit of bench, straddling it so Elizabeth could sit safely resting against his chest. She set one of the mugs before him and squeezed onto the bench.

"Well, look an’ see how the children have come," sang out one of the men, Gill maybe. "So the cap’n’s finished raking ye over the coals, has ‘e?"

"For the moment, thankfully."

"Aye, ‘til the next time one o’ ye two go muckin’ up." That one was O’Roarke. Will remembered him.

"I don’t intend for there to be a next time," Elizabeth cut in proudly.

Gill again. "Don’t matter what you intend. A woman goes pretendin’ she can crew, ill comes of it. Ye ain’t got the strength it takes, an’ any c’n see or hear when ye speak ye’re all highbred ‘n’ delicate."

"It wasn’t my hauling he was criticizing; it was my knot work. I thought I knew how to tie a sheet bend."

Will stroked her arm. "You did it right…" but Gill spoke over him.

"Every sailor knows that." Will swallowed a mouthful of rum to cover the moment. God, it was awful. Elizabeth sipped hers absently while she sized up Gill.

"Will you show me then? They won’t take me out of the watch rotation as short as we are, so at least I can learn to do it right."

"Won’t help. Ye’re still too frail." O’Roarke was really loathsome; that’s all there was to it.

"I’ve the strength of any ship’s boy, certainly."

"Aye, if ye aren’t a boy yerself, that is," put in a new and bitter voice. And there was Braxton, the nasty brute who’d worn a gaudy bandage around his wrist their first days at sea.

"There are strange consequences to sailing with a witch," Elizabeth retorted. "I didn’t ask for that."

Now the dice games had halted. Every man’s interest was on the conversation.

"Asked or not - there’s somethin’ unnatural about ye."

"A lot of the men won’t believe what they don’t see."

"One way t’ settle the question!"

"Show some respect!" Will barked, tightening his arm around Elizabeth’s waist.

"I shall most certainly not be disrobing to satisfy your curiosity!"

"Ah, she’s as prissy as a girl, mates!"

"Besides," she added sniffily, "it rather makes me wonder whether you’re angling for glimpse of a lady or a boy."

Will gaped. He’d always loved Elizabeth practicing swords with him and the slightly shocking things she sometimes said. If she didn’t quite fit in high society, it meant society couldn’t take her away from a humble blacksmith. ‘In character,’ she’d said. It occurred to him only now, just where, with a little exaggeration of her character, Elizabeth might fit. Because the men were delighted.

"Oho! Hear how she talks! Been hangin’ round in rough company too long, have ye, missy? Been hearin’ stories? What ‘ave you heard?"

"Nothing I’d care to repeat to you nor you to me. I am, however, still awaiting a demonstration of a sheet bend."

"Hmmph."

"I won’t disrobe, but…" She held out her mug, and rum rations were tight enough what with the hold space devoted to Barbossa’s wine that this was quite an offer. "Please?"

They were back again the next night, and the night after that. And a night or two after that, the skinny one called Whippet parted his tankard from his lips thoughtfully, peered at Elizabeth, and drawled, "You said Cap’n Jack died t’ save ‘is crew." Heads up and down the table turned toward them.

Elizabeth grinned. "Yes, I did." She sipped her rum.

"Well?" Gill pressed.

"Do you want to hear the story?"

"O’ course, lass. Mr. Gibbs said ye’re the only one what could tell it a’right."

"That’s no more than the truth," she nodded. "I was the last one off The Pearl before she went down. Mr. Gibbs did tell you about the kraken, I’m sure?"

Murmurs of ‘aye’ and ‘that he did’ from all sides.

"Well then, the kraken, foul and deadly as it was, was enslaved by Davy Jones, and he’d set it to hunt Jack, and only Jack, on account of his debt. Now, quite honestly, I may have spoken a bit hastily before. You shouldn’t think him too much of a hero; he was running from that monster as any sensible man would. But when it caught up, you see, it would have killed him to leave The Pearl just as much as to stay. He said to me, he said, ‘Lizzie’ - and don’t you get any ideas," she pointed all around the circle with the mouth of her bottle, "no one calls me ‘Lizzie;’ Captain Sparrow might be alive today if he hadn’t, but he said, ‘Lizzie, it’s no good…"

"Gah!"

"Augh!"

"Holy mother of God!"

"What?" Elizabeth looked ‘round at them all, quite exasperated.

"Elizabeth, you sounded just like him," Will answered uneasily. "Like during the ritual."

"I…really?"

He nodded, and the other men shifted nervously.

Elizabeth sat in shock for a moment then laughed shakily to the men. "Blasted witch, eh?" Mutters of agreement. "So! Do you want to hear the story or not?"

"…Aye."

"Do you want to hear it with proper impersonations or not?"

There was a short silence before it occurred to Whippet that this was actually an excellent turn of events for their entertainment. "Aye!" The others were inspired to agree.

"All right then." Will could see Elizabeth was working herself up for some really elaborate flourishes. Jack would have been proud. "So Captain Jack said to me, "Ahh, Lizzie, it’s no good, love, I can’t go. Wouldn’t be right for me Black Pearl t’ face such an ugly beastie alone.’ And I said, ‘Jack, you said yourself she’s just a ship.’ And he said, ‘No one ever believes anything I say; don’t you start now. Anyway, it works out for you and the lads quite nicely, don’t it?’ And I said that we wouldn’t ever leave without him. ‘Not t’ worry, I’ve got a plan,’ he said, and he gave me this look - which is the look he gives when he’s thought of something good and wants to be mysterious about it. And I gave him this look - which is the look I give when someone had better tell me something or get slapped. So he says, ‘What I’m going t’ do, love, is take me sword, an’ when that pestiliferous blight upon creation opens its nasty maw, I’m going t’ jump straight in.’ ‘You’re an idiot, Jack," I said, because he was. And he said, ‘No tears now, Liz’ - and I wasn’t crying - ‘ye’re ruinin’ the part where this saves all your lives. Get on with ye.’ And so I left him there on The Pearl, and we all got away, and that was how it happened."

"You lied to them," Will said later when they’d emerged from the belowdecks into the clean night air.

"Well, I couldn’t very well tell them about any kissing when we’ve so recently got them off trying to jump me in the hold."

"A very good point," he conceded.