epilogue - all i knew was i could not leave her there
A Surfeit of Fools
The people were saying
No two e'er were wed
But one has a sorrow
That never was said...
I dreamed it last night
That my dead love came in
So softly she entered
Her feet made no din
She came close beside me
And this she did say:
It will not be long, love
'Til our wedding day
- "She Moved Thro' the Fair", traditional
In the bleak years to come, the servants will have a turnover rate of roughly one month, coming and going as they please with the Norrington family silver, the late Prudence Swann's vast collection of paste jewels, and Elizabeth Norrington nee Swann's best silk petticoats. She is forgotten here, left to rot in the islands with nothing but her madness left for company.
Aftr all, madness is an affliction the Lady Elizabeth Norrington cultivates, and cultivate it she shall, at least for the next decade or so, or at least until her girlish figure goes and she comes out of the stupor she's hidden in ever since Will's ship sunk on the crossing back from England where he was doing business for her father. She married James Norrington before she had a chance to wear her mourning blacks. She's worn black ever since. Seventeen years have passed by the time she comes out of her stupor--for a hanging of all things.
July 7, 1692 is a Sunday. Closer to God, as they are wont to joke as they go to meet the gallows, men condemned to die justly for their sins--before man, God, and a serious lack of angels.
***
In the end, neither recognizes the other--Will is searching the crowd for the face that haunts his dreams, still hemmed in by the romantic notion that love rides you away from the mess you've made of your life, and all of Elizabeth's attentions are focused on the crusty old tar intent on meeting his maker beside Will.
"Turned out, she did. My lady nivir leaves th' 'ouse, but she's come ter see me to th' Gates, bless me if she ain't!"
Will rolls his eyes, and follows the old man's incline of the head. The lady is clad all in black, her hair powdered, her eyes obscured by a veil. Her dress is badly outmoded by at least a decade or so, yet she holds herself straight-backed upon a white palfrey, like some ancient pagan queen. A maid is sitting on the grass nearby, prim and proper except for a hint of red petticoats. There's a monkey atop her shoulder, a clever little fellow clad in a green jacket with a jaunty little tricorn perced atop his head.
"Got 'er that monkey I did, how my lady screamed the firs' time she saw it! Didn't like monkeys much, but 'e's a sweet little fellow--" the man continues rambling, while Will settles himself into the cart, intent on what must come. They hadn't tied him this tight, by God, the last time he was sentenced to hang. This is the first time it's been without Jack though, and considering Jack's probably holed up on some debauched island paradise waiting for the current naval storm to blow over, the sick feeling in Will's chest tells him it's likely Jack won't show. In fact, considering the terms in which they last parted, it's likely Jack won't show at all and Will is shit out of luck.
***
This is his last memory of earthly delight, and what a memory it is! Waking in a mass of tangled sheets and cool sea air with a slight tang of salt he can't smell any longer, arms and legs a-tangle. The cabin boy, just a chocolately gaze and a delicious arse (that bottom caused Will to steal him from the bordello the night before), moans in his sleep and rolls over, leaving Will the dubious honor of observing him properly and without the aid of a stiff drink. How the angels must have wept to see him in that Havana hell! Curly dark blond hair frames a chiseled, heart-shaped face, complete with a dark red lips and smooth cheeks--there's a dimple in his chin that drew Will the night before--a night for ghosts and sins and sex, any way he wanted it. A hellish glimpse of white-clad whores and red -robed monks dances just below his lids, tempting him...Twelve virgins and a black mass...Freemasonry and the Hellfire and Brimstone club were more of Jack's thing, really...
The sooty lashes flutter open, and wide eyes peer up at Will in frank amusement. Shuddering in sudden horror at what he's done--Wrong, wrong... --Will can only gape. For the youth has eyes of china blue instead of brown, and in the morning light his hair is more red than blond (unlike Her, it's always about Her for him). And when the youth opens his mouth, Will suffers his second shock.
"Oo's Elizabeth, guv?"
"Eliz--Elizabeth?" Will croaks, and there's suddenly a pounding at the door that reminds him of his hangover. He's never given the chance to respond, because the door slams open with a resounding crash, leaving Will blinking in the sharp light. "Don't move, lad," he hisses to the boy, but it's too late--the angel bounces up, and with a swagger to his hips (narrow, he likes to be gripped just so), he demands
"Oo are you?"
"Who am I? Who am I? I'm Captain Jack Sparrow, boyo, and if that appallin' behavior between your legs is any indication, you have heard of me." Jack's roughish wink at said offensive behavior softens the jab.
"Jack--listen--"
"I think I've listened enough, thank you Will. In case you've failed to notice, the walls here ain't the thickest. Young sir, what is this all about?"
The boy drapes a sheet regretfully about those slim hips (is that bruise a love bite? He must be a monster, he's bruised an angel...) and simpers in a way that infuriates Will. "Cap'n Turner 'ere saved me from El Corazon. Said I'd be workin' as a cabin boy on 'is ship, yer lordship."
"Ah, but your 'Captain' Turner failed to mention a matter of importance you may find enlightening. This ship ain't his, y'see, it's mine, an' we don't need a cabin boy. The position is, how shall I say, taken."
"I could change yer mind, yer lordship. I'm very--persuasive--when I puts me mind to it." The boy sidles up to Jack, and Will wants to rend him limb from limb as he whispers something in Jack's ear, sliding his hand down the front material of the illustrious Captain's trousers.
Will starts up from the bed, crossing the room to angrily yank the boy away, but something cold and hard in Jack's eyes stops him. "Jack, this is--" in horror, Will realizes he's never bothered to learn the youth's name.
"Whatever name ye fancies, yer lordship." Laying a too-familiar hand on Jack's sleeve, the youth flutters and simpers. Jack grins wickedly down at him, a look that sends waves of hot anger through Will's veins.
"'Yer lordship', eh? I like you, boyo. If you want me to like you even more, you'll get out. Now."
With a sashay of the hips, the bordello angel takes his sweet time going out the door, a gesture totally wasted on both pirates, neither of whom watch him go.
"Jack--I can explain--"
"A pistol with one shot, and an island of yer very own. You'd like that, wouldn't you Will? An eternity spent with yer ghosts."
"He was supposed to have brown eyes. Brown eyes and blond hair. I swear, Jack--"
"Seventeen years I've waited for Turner to come around, " Jack muses to himself. "That's nigh on twenty, and we're no longer the young men we once were, and even though I've given him many a chance he always throws it back in m' face." There's a certain bleakness in his tone, and Will reaches out, but Jack brushes past him as though he isn't there, as though he's never meant anything to him besides a warm body. "This was it, mate. This was it, and you lost it."
***
Will ends up emporer of his very own island, and two days later he's picked up for piracy with a boatload of buccaneers just outside of Port Royal. Jack's enjoying his newfound cabin boy more than all of Will's lurid imaginings can produce, and as for Elizabeth, she's charging down Gallows Hill on her horse, headed straight for the platform and her ancient friend when the first tremor erupts.
***
Elizabeth is nearly thrown from her horse. The animal screams as cracks begin to spiderweb across the plaza, but with her riding crop, she is able to force the animal where he doesn't want to go--straight into the belly of the beast. The fleeing crowd surges around them; the unfortunate few who have fallen are trampled in the rush for safety. The pirates have thrown themselves off the hangman's platform, and are trying to make their way as well.
"Bart!" She screams, too late. One of the cracks shifts, widens, and catches her friend by his wooden leg. Both pirates stumble, and the horse's eyeballs are rolling back to the whites as he struggles with Elizabeth--one turning back, the other running away. It all has to end in disaster, and it does--another tremor jolts Elizabeth from the saddle, and and the horse rears, spilling her to the unwelcoming ground. Where most would flee, Elizabeth is made of sterner stuff. She runs for her friend, tripping and falling, trying to stay balanced. The air smells rank, like rotting eggs and pestilence. "Bart!" She cries. "Grab my hand!"
Bart grasps for her wildly, but misjudges the distance and slips further into the crack, pulling his gallows-mate along with him. Elizabeth grabs for the other man, and fumbling with his restraints, manages to undo the ropes about his hands. Together, they heave at Bart, but another quake sends the whole struggle straight to hell as the cobblestones close over Bart's shoulders, leaving just his head above ground. The air and the earth still at once, although they can still hear shouting and crashing echoing from all over the city, silence settles over the three of them.
The other man looks at her and mouths one word: Run. Elizabeth doesn't move. She's closing the eyelids of the dead man, but they spring resolutely open, as though seeing beyond these walls she's put up around herself for so long.
"You're coming with me, sirrah." Elizabeth says in wonderment, as though she can't quite believe she's been so bold. Later, she'll wish she died in the earthquake, but for now this is an adventure, one she's thought and dreamed about for a long time.
***
"What's your story?" It's much later. Will crosses his arms, leaning back, a fine figure of a man if there ever was one--white ruffled shirt, dark blue topcoat brocaded in gold, tight-fitting pantaloons that leave little to the imagination. He's sporting a rather impressive hat he's picked up during the looting, with overly large black plumes. She's only known one man with a fondness for plumes...But let that bide.
"I married a man I didn't love when my lover was lost to sea."
"And this man, the one who loves you now, you don't think he'll try to save you? If you were my woman, I'd drain the Caribbean dry and then search every grain of sand 'til I found you."
She's suddenly beset by wistfulness, wistfulness for the things she's lost. "No, you see--I'd been raised my whole life to be a pretty thing on a pedestal, a perfect ornament to any gentleman." A strange smile twists her lips. "Well, I wasn't, but that's..."
"That is exactly as ladies of your rank should aspire to be," he nods. "On a pedestal to us commoners. I'm sure you're a treasure to your husband. I, on the other hand, like my women a bit more--"
"And I suppose you have a woman in every port!" Clapping a fine-boned hand over her mouth, the lady blushes. "I'm sorry, I'm afraid my sense of propriety went the way of--" My sanity.
"Is that it, then, love? Has he another woman, or a score? Aye, I'll admit I've a child or two, but I've arranged it so they'll be apprenticed up, workin' for honest pay."
"That's an odd sentiment for a pirate, sirrah." Patting her hair, she gives the man the impression of chill, unattainable serenity. He's gotten a better look at her now, and the woman he once thought was a beauty behind the veil, well, perhaps once she was a beauty. The remanants of past loveliness still cling to her, like rose petals scattered and trampled by children."Why, if I didn't know better, I'd swear you were a gentleman yourself."
"Not by birth, no." His eyes are dark and unfathomable. "And like you, milady, I loved and lost someone as well. But it was treachery and revenge that drove us apart, nothing so clear cut as your little tale."
"I'd love to hear it, if you have the time." She lays her fingers gingerly on the arm he proffers her, and they duck into one of the private, walled-in gardens left behind to ruin and rot. There is a strong burning smell wafting up from the city, but that doesn't matter here.
"Milady, you saved my life. For you, I have all the time in the world." He allows her to lead him into the lime trees, broken branches bent together over a cracked marble bench, making a small grotto in which they can rest. "But what about your husband? Won't he come looking for you?"
"My husband is married to his work, my good pirate. The sea is a jealous wife--there's no room for any other woman in his life, and I haven't been the best at..." she pauses. "Well, I asked you first."
His eyes are far away as he begins, hands behind his back, pacing a green path around the bench. "I fell in love with the right person at the wrong time, and it's haunted me for the rest of my days. Like you, she was born to privilige, but we loved one another since childhood."
"So you became a pirate to better your lot in life?" My lady pats the spot next to her on the bench. He eyes it and her warily, for there's a crack clear down the middle, separating them in every way that matters--in status and in dreams. There's a wall between them that he's not prepared to scale, they may have this one little thing in common, but so do many others. She's not waiting to be rescued, and honestly, even if she was, he's not that man anymore.
"No. That's simple, clean-cut. I said this was a story of betrayal." He breaks eye contact with her and continues pacing. "Do you believe in ghosts?" Will can tell he's said the wrong thing because the woman's eyes become sad and far away, as though she's drifting just below the surface. "Aye, well, I won't disturb you with the tale, but I won my love through high adventure and feats of bravery. We were betrothed to be wed, such are the best laid plans of youth!"
"All lovers young, all lovers must,
Consign to thee and come to dust,*" she muses idly, as though in afterthought.
"Aye," he says. Some terrible suspiscion has begun to prickle under his skin, for the lady is beginning to disturb him for reasons he can't put a finger on. "Everything was planned -- her father disapproved of me, as I was a tradesman, and he wanted a long engagement, but as I said, nothing would stop us from being together. What I didn't realize was that nothing is sacred in this century, not even love.
"Her father decided to give me a foothold up in the world, as it were, for he doted on his only daughter, as did I. How I wish I had never accepted! He must have planned it all, the old devil! He and that--that poltroon she ended up with!"
"Oooh, it sounds simply wicked!"
"That isn't the end of it," he continues somberly. Mostly he's stunned by the lack of the rage that usually accompanies this part of the story. "They'd been in it together all along. She was supposed to marry a navy man--a man old enough to be her father! But she fell for me instead--a man with no money, just a vision of her. That wasn't enough--they had to make sure we'd never see one another again, and they did. Hired thugs to play pirate and blow the ship out of the water. But I survived. I was rescued by an old friend of mine and my father's," he continues. "And then I left to find her, to get her back. But by then..."
"Alas, alack..." she interrupts in a sing-song voice. He waits for her to continue, but there's nothing more forthcoming.
"By then she'd married the poltroon, and there was nothing left for me on land."
"How horrid!" Hand at her throat, she gasps dramatically, lucid again. "Didn't you try to steal her away?"
Will takes a deep breath, composing his features. "I did the wrong thing, my lady. I confronted the man she'd married, threatened to expose him if he didn't give her up. He laughed in my face." His words are matter-of-fact, and he marvels to himself at the lack of poison these words usually bring to the surface. "Then he had me arrested for piracy and thievery, and threw me in gaol to rot."
"Come," she beckons. Women always seem to want to comfort him, and this intriguing gentlewoman is no different. She takes his hat off and pulls his head in her lap, loosening his queue and running her fingers through the tendrils of his hair. Jack was right; all ladies are whores in the end..."You're shaking, sirrah."
"I hardly speak of her," he lies. "My father's friend busted me out, pretending to be the hangman, and I drifted into the trade, as it were." And into his bed. "But I never missed a chance to spy on my lady from afar, to see what I'd missed. Then she was with child, and from what I could tell, she was happy--"
"But you never learned to let her go."
"How did you know?"
The lady's eyes have grown cloudy again, inside herself he supposes. "When my lover drowned at sea, I began to die a little. That was when I started to see him everywhere--at the edges of the jungle, where paradise meets man, in the faces of the crowd at my wedding, sitting on my windowsill at night, in my daughter's eyes. But they took my baby away." Her lower lip wobbles dangerously. "It's strange, but I feel as though I can tell you everything...That was when I really lost it. It was easier to live in a dream than reality. My husband locked me away from my daughter, away from the ghost of my lover. He was always there, in the marriage bed, you see. It was easier to be a madwoman--and perhaps I used it as a crutch more than I should have."
"There's a pair of us then, pretending to be what we're not." Rising, he lifts her hand, grazing his lips against the indent of her palm. "Will you square things, do you think, with your lord and master?"
"I shan't, I imagine. Let him have his illusion of that girl. I'd rather run away and be a pirate queen--my life needs some adventure. Yo ho, yo ho and all that."
"I hate to be the one to break it to you, love, but piracy's a bit of a bore. Lots of waitin' for ships to come, yer teeth turn black as coal an' drop out." He has a golden grin, and it makes her shudder now. "Not so much adventure as you'd think."
He's a bit sick of adventure himself, and at this point, just wants a pirate named Sparrow and a bottle of madeira.
"You paint a very unromantic picture," she seethes. But she still has an echo of her old beauty, and he can see it when she looks at him just so--cool and appraising, in the way that rich women have gazed at their male inferiors with for centuries. She carries herself like a beautiful woman, even if the ravages of time have rent it asunder. "I've never wrapped my legs around a pirate. Will that do?"
He can see it now--the lady, cream and silk, himself, dark and rough against her. The un-ladylike screams she'd make, clawing at his back and begging him to take her the way he takes his whores. The way he takes Jack. He's shaking his head even as he's thinking it. "Alas, madam, I must be going if I'm to make it to Tortugua."
She turns crimson, and makes an ineffectual wave at the harbor. Over the sea wall, he can see that the sea has receded several hundred yards, leaving ships and skiffs stranded alike. People are scurrying like ants to and fro, their stolen booty crammed willy-nilly into sacks. There's a hidden cove he knows about, with a little boat enough for one man. He'll go to that cove now, for the lady will give him anything. He can see it in her eyes. "I'll see you off," she rises. "It's the least I can do."
***
They reach the cove on horseback, heavily laden down with water skeins and foodstuffs for the journey ahead of him. Perhaps he'll be in luck, and the Black Pearl will drift out of the morning haze, his savior once again. Likely not. But it's a fond dream, a new dream to keep him going. He won't stop until he finds Jack, and tells him the truths he's realized. The skiff is still there, hidden in the foliage, and he makes short work of rigging the sails and readying it for voyage. The lady clasps his hand, and removes her veil, dazzling him with her powdered curls and her chocolatey eyes. She presses a soft kiss against his rough cheek, a shade on its way to the Underworld.
"What did you say your name was again?" It's an afterthought, a shout across the water, and she turns, back to the sun, the powder white suddenly blowing off her hair, turning it into a brilliant gold that he must shield his eyes from.
Her words drift across the water, lost in the breeze, and it's only later, halfway to Tortugua, that he makes sense of their music.
Elizabeth. Lady Elizabeth Norrington.
Author's Notes: This began as a 15 minute ficlet. Then I decided I wanted to participate in fabu's feedback ficathon, and so that meant I had to finish it in two weeks. Obviously I didn't participate in the ficathon, but I did finish it! Much thanks to hija_paloma for beta'ing! You're the best!
All song lyrics quoted in the subject lines are from the song "Maybe It Was The Roses" by the Grateful Dead.
If you have any unanswered questions, flames, crits, etc--please post them here. I'm not afraid of your censure.
*All lovers young, all lovers must...Consign to thee and come to dust -- "Cymbeline", Act 4. Shakespeare. 1609/10.