the Dalaverse

15.

Norrington had spent the better part of an afternoon chastising a handful of young marines who’d thought it amusing to line the seat of Lieutenant Gillette’s chair with black ink. Privately he had found it to be just a little funny to see Gillette hoping around like an outraged partridge (and so had Groves), but disrespect had to be punished. At least the gentlemen had had the sense to come clean; he suspected Groves would not have taken the whole thing so lightly if no culprits readily turned themselves in.

Ned greeted him at the door, letting him drum fingers down a sloping spine. “Evening, sir. Where’s Jack gotten to?” Ned flitted off without an answer, so Norrington went to check the study and the bedrooms, shedding clothing as he went so that he was down to shirt, breeches, and stockings by the time he found his quarry outside the kitchen.

The door to the garden was open and Jack was sitting on the small stone bench outside, his knees drawn up to his chin. Late afternoon sunlight filtered through the orange trees to burnish his skin a light gold, though six months ago it would have been bronze. He didn’t look up when Norrington approached, smile fading from his lips as he saw the distance in the dark eyes fixed on the setting sun.

“Jack?” A light touch on his head made him start and look up. Whatever was troubling him, it was quickly masked by an easygoing grin. Norrington knew he’d get no answers from Jack tonight, only the prospect of a cold bed, so he let it go. He draped himself over the back of the bench, pressing his cheek to Jack’s.

“‘Ey,” Jack said fondly, leaning back against him.

Turning his head, Norrington realized that the kitchen through which he’d just passed did not smell like cooking. “Isn’t Mrs. Perry here? It’s nearly suppertime.”

“Haven’t seen her all day,” said Jack, pouting as Norrington pulled away from him to stand straight. He stuck out his arms to be lifted to his feet and Norrington complied, grunting when Jack slumped purposefully against him. He frowned as he half-dragged the pirate back into the house. Mrs. Perry had been out when he’d left that morning, running errands – or so he had assumed.

Jack slipped an arm around his waist and under his belt, tickling his mustache against Norrington’s neck. “No worries – I’m sure we can find something t’do until she gets back.”

“I’m hungry,” Norrington protested. Jack shoved him down into a chair and grabbed a red apple out of the basket on the table.

“Here, you whimpering babe,” he said, awarding Norrington with the fruit after he’d given it a quick polish with a thankfully clean sleeve.

Feeling sulky and wishing for Jack to play up to him, Norrington said, “I don’t want – oh.” And that was always the problem – the moment Jack touched him, he had no will for anything but writhing and touching him back.

A hand squeezed his rapidly hardening cock again, Jack’s wicked smile plastered over his face. He slid to his knees without taking his eyes or his hand off of Norrington, who could only try to keep his breathing steady and stare back at him. Relief flooded him when Jack dipped his head to concentrate on undoing his buttons in the near-dark, the heavy weight of his hair resting on Norrington’s thigh. He held still, waiting for the hot, moist glory of that mouth to descend on him. When it didn’t, he pouted at Jack.

“Please...” He didn’t care that his throat caught on a plea, not when Jack was looking up at him and licking his lips as though he craved Norrington’s taste like an opiate.

“The apple, Gabriel,” Jack murmured, flicking his tongue out to come so close to the tip of Norrington’s cock that he could feel the displaced air. No blood, there was no blood in his brain at all... “A bite,” Jack was saying, “take a bite of it.”

He glanced dumbly at the apple in his hand, bruising from the force of his grip. Raising it uncertainly to his mouth, he waited for Jack to nod eagerly before he sank his teeth into it.

Norrington had always loved apples: the shine of the skin, the crisp scent, the way the meat of the fruit gave only when you applied sufficient pressure with teeth and gums. He knew Jack preferred oranges, liked to suck all the juices and spit out the pulp, but from the way his pupils dilated when Norrington bit into his apple, they might soon share a favorite fruit.

The fruit was lush from being squeezed so hard and its juice dribbled down his chin. Jack made a noise like he’d been pinched and caught Norrington’s hands, keeping him from wiping it away. He grabbed onto Norrington’s neck and pulled himself up to lick the errant juice, catching it just before it dripped onto his shirt. Norrington opened his mouth under Jack’s insistent tongue, which sought out every trace of tart and brought with it the citrus sweet of oranges.

He was never going to be able to eat fruit without blushing again, that was for damned sure.

Managing to keep himself from melting off the chair when Jack made his way back down, Norrington took no chances this time and laced his fingers though Jack’s hair, miraculously avoiding getting stabbed with anything sharp. He needed no directing, however, bending over Norrington to take him deep with a soft pleased moan. Norrington cried out at the intensity – the juice of the apple stung faintly – but the sensations were cut short once again, albeit not so drastically. Jack’s lips slid back down his shaft until he was just gently teasing the head, licking at it mockingly.

“Jack,” Norrington said, feeling as though his voice would crack, “if you want any of this to be reciprocated, you’d better start...” He paused, scarcely believing he was saying this out loud. “Start sucking.”

The black eyes flashed in amusement and renewed desire, but he kept his mouth closed, his lips puckering a kiss against Norrington’s pulsing cock. And Norrington suddenly understood.

He took another bite of the apple.

Jack sucked him down again, working his throat and doing marvelous things with his tongue. His hands came up to lavish attention on Norrington’s balls, squeezing and stroking and rolling sensitive flesh in elegant fingers. The feverish swell of pleasure distracted him from Jack’s own needs, so that he was shocked when Jack pulled off and planted himself firmly in Norrington’s lap. The apple got knocked out of his hand as Jack launched an attack on his mouth, bringing a taste familiar and vaguely like saltwater with him this time, meeting the last traces of apple to join them both in a bittersweet flavor he found both appropriate and very intoxicating.

Jack’s erection was sliding against his own, his breeches having gone missing at some point, but that contact too was abruptly denied him. What the devil was wrong with –

“Cooking oil,” Jack hissed out between clenched teeth, flinging things out of the pantry until he came up with the large tin. He used a dazed Norrington’s shoulders to lever himself up on the table and then it all made sense. Norrington pressed him down, ran hands up the legs wrapping around his waist.

Watching him hungrily as he fumbled with the lid, Jack panted, “Had a mind to pound you boneless tonight, but ‘m afraid you’d break the table.”

“Are you calling me fat?” Norrington demanded, stroking the cool oil onto himself with trembling hands.

“‘Course not,” said Jack, wriggling delightedly as Norrington shoved a couple of fingers into him. “But y’are a – oooh yes, very nice – quite a sturdy boy, there, Gabriel.”

“Sturdy,” Norrington repeated breathlessly, thrusting forward – oh God –

Jack’s eyes rolled back in his head as he tightened his thighs and his internal muscles. “Blazes – yeah, sturdy...strapping, one might even say...c’mon and fuck me...”

“If you’d stop – chattering –” Norrington managed before he adjusted to the tricky angle and drove into him properly. The table shot back a few inches and they both wobbled, Jack balanced on the edge and Norrington trying desperately not to fall. When they steadied themselves again, Jack burst out laughing.

“Do it again, we’re nearly to the wall,” he said, stopping mid-chuckle as Norrington obeyed, stepping forward along with the movement of the table until it hit the wall. A moment of adjustment and he was thrusting again, hands braced on the table, Jack whipping his head back and groaning wordlessly. His back was going to be murder tomorrow, he reflected distantly. Jack distracted him from his rather arbitrary thoughts by unclenching one hand from Norrington’s bicep to stroke himself in time with the quickening pace, since there was no chance of Norrington risking his precarious balance by doing so.

He had to think when he was doing this, had to concentrate even while he lost himself in the way Jack moved beneath him, because in those moments it was too easy to believe. Jack was too needy, too raw – Norrington was afraid that he’d make any sort of promise if he was asked. And he feared that in some dark moment he would ask, that he’d fall for the way Jack clutched at him, the way that said he didn’t ever want to leave – the pretty lie given and taken when ecstasy overtook any desire for honesty. He didn’t want it to come to that.

But he did want it to come to this: Jack suddenly tensing, gripping Norrington’s shoulder to pull himself up as his face contorted and he breathed out Norrington’s name. For all his noise and bluster, he rarely spoke above a whisper in that final moment, hardly ever said anything but a quiet, wondering, “Gabriel.” His eyes flickered open almost as an afterthought and Norrington held his gaze as he let go into tight heat and molten flesh and Jack – “Jack – Jack...”, his own release accompanied by an undignified shout.

To his sorrow, he had to slide out almost immediately if he wanted to fall forward atop Jack’s body, both swift motions provoking a little “Ooof” from the other man. Jack’s legs dropped back down on either side of him – and now he knew where such muscles came from. Jack could probably do this standing up. Norrington would have to mention it when he wasn’t so completely undone.

Jack spider-walked fingers up and down his back, dropping a kiss onto his cheek. “I swear, you get better and better at that.”

Norrington grunted in thanks, mouthing the sweat from Jack’s neck.

“I meant it about the table, though,” said Jack, smacking him between the shoulder blades. “I know you like a good cuddle, but shove off, eh?”

With a sigh, Norrington eased himself up, feeling the table creaking dangerously beneath him. A mumbled curse greeted his ears as he helped Jack to his feet, and a cold thread of worry struck him. “I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

Jack smiled at him and shook his head. “No more’n I asked you to. I’m tired, though, and I’d like to see a bed before I collapse.”

“You’ll get no arguments from me,” said Norrington with feeling, pressing a hand to the small of his back. “Aunt Rose always said I’d meet my death chasing after pirates, but I never expected it to happen this literally.”

The sound of a door closing at the front of the house sent them both scrambling for discarded breeches and a cloth to clean off Jack’s belly. They were mildly presentable by the time Mrs. Perry came in, though still flushed and shaky on their feet.

She took one look at them and rolled her eyes.

Norrington brushed a hand across his flaming cheeks. “Good evening, madam.”

“‘M terrible sorry, sir, but Miss Eliz’beth’s time came this mornin’ and I went to make m’self useful.”

Jack grabbed her by the arm, his eyebrows shooting up. “Lizzie’s had her baby? Is she all right? Is it healthy? Did Will faint? What is it, girl or boy?”

Mrs. Perry shooed him. “Calm down, man, I cain’t think wiv ye prattling on!” Norrington nodded sympathetically, nearly as eager as Jack to hear the news.

“It’s a lovely li’l girl,” said Mrs. Perry, beaming proudly. “Both’re doin’ just fine, and the papa’d fallen asleep in the babe’s rockin’ chair last I seen him.”

The expression taking over Jack’s face was a sight to see, one that made a smile touch Norrington’s own lips. He let it stretch and widen when Jack looked at him, reaching down to squeeze his hand.

“C’n one o’ you boys tell me why the table’s all shoved up ‘gainst the wall?” asked Mrs. Perry, planting fists on her hips with a sudden air of menace.

Jack and Norrington both took a step back. Norrington merely shook his head when Jack looked at him, speechless with chagrin.

“You might want to give it a good scrub, love,” he said with a cheeky wink at Mrs. Perry, before Norrington pulled him along as he fled the room.

They scrambled up the stairs to the sounds of a despondent “Ye didn’t! Not on me table!”

Norrington’s room was closer to the stairwell so it was there they ducked in, Jack sprawling across the bed and Norrington following at a more sedate pace.

“A girl,” said Jack with a smile and a disbelieving full-body shake that set his hair to twinkling. “A sweet little lass – the third generation of Turner I’ll have held in me arms.” He rose to his knees, tugging on the hem of Norrington’s shirt. “Can’t we go see them now?”

Norrington laughed quietly, stripping his rumpled clothing. “I think we ought to give them a couple of days at least, Jack.”

Jack hummed a quiet tune as he got undressed himself, so lost in his thoughts that he became tangled in his shirt and Norrington had to help extract him from it. He curled up complacently in Norrington’s arms, for once not fighting for space or control of the blanket.

“You know what?” Jack said sleepily, pressing his thumb to the inside of Norrington’s elbow.

“Hmmm?” It was barely past dusk, but the incident in the kitchen had exhausted him and he would really have preferred that Jack be quiet.

“I knew,” said Jack with perfect conviction. “Knew it was goin’ to be a girl. Had a dream.” He snuggled into Norrington’s side and Norrington was suddenly wide awake as he was hit by a realization that made him gasp. Why it was prompted at this particular moment, he wasn’t sure, but it was sudden and undeniable.

He was in love with Jack.

He blinked rapidly, trying to clear the burst of stars from his vision.

“Gabriel?” Jack took his face in both hands and tilted his head to one side, then the other. “Got somethin’ in your eye?”

Norrington stared at him for a few seconds before he said slowly, “No...no, I’m fine.”

Nothing had changed between his last thought and this one, and yet even the ceiling looked different.

“Mmph,” said Jack, satisfied with this answer. “Sleep then.” He burrowed under the coverlet, sliding down and then up Norrington’s side before falling still with a sigh. Norrington touched his face with, he felt, remarkably steady hands considering that his entire world had just been shaken on its axis. Jack murmured appreciatively at the attention, his breathing drawing out evenly and deeply. He was asleep before Norrington could open his mouth to say – to say what?

To tell him. Of course he would have to tell him.

He tried it out in his mind as Jack snorted in his sleep.
I love you, Jack.

Four little words, three if he left off the name. That wasn’t so difficult. He could cry them to the heavens as he spent himself in Jack’s mouth or his body or his hand. He could whisper them into the golden shell of an ear just as Jack was waking up. He could say them over dinner, or while they were teasing Ned with bits of twine, or he could even write them in a letter and leave it on the pillow for Jack to find – no, that last one was cowardly, he would have to actually speak aloud.

The more he thought of it, the less daunting the prospect became. He wasn’t sure what Jack would do once he said it, but that didn’t matter. It would work itself out somehow. It had to, because he was in love and he still believed that carried some kind of weight in the universe, a weight that sex on a kitchen table would never have, no matter how good it might be. Somehow, somehow he’d be able to keep the bird he’d sheltered, once Jack knew about this. The timing had to be right, though, had to be perfect – everything might depend on the timing.

Jack mumbled something about a pony and pinking shears. Norrington gently stroked the scars on his left forearm and fell asleep feeling that his mind had been restored to order and a great burden taken from it.


16.

Once again, Jack couldn’t sleep.

He lay on his back, studying the ceiling. Closing his eyes, he tried to see the ceiling of his cabin on the Pearl above him, closer than this one and made of dark, unpainted wood. The memory wasn’t very clear, however, as he didn’t usually spend a great deal of time studying his own ceiling, so he soon gave up.

His thoughts turned to the newest arrival in Port Royal, which was an infinitely more interesting topic. He and Norrington had been to visit the Turners today, greeting an exhausted Elizabeth, a thunderstruck Will who could’ve been knocked over with a feather, and a tiny black-haired creature with all ten toes and all ten fingers, safe and healthy. They had called her Morgan, which Elizabeth swore was an old family name. Jack suspected otherwise. In any case, Sir Henry couldn’t have been prouder to have such a pretty little girl bearing his name.

It had amused Jack to no end to watch Norrington panic when Elizabeth gently laid the baby in his arms. She had started wailing and he’d turned white, immediately giving her back. She’d cried when Jack first held her, too, but Jack had arrived with the intention of making that child fall madly in love with him. He had cooed to her and dangled some of the beads in his hair, and after a few minutes it seemed as though Morgan had inherited her mother’s fascination with pirates. He’d kept her until she got a suspiciously pleased look on her face and warmth began to soak through her diaper, at which point he’d hastily handed her back to her mother. Babies were all well and good, but there were some things he was not going to deal with unless it was absolutely necessary.

Norrington shifted beside him and sighed tiredly. “Jack. Go to sleep.” He pulled Jack into his arms, stroking his hair. Jack wriggled closer to him. He’d met Bill’s granddaughter today and nothing could have made him more content – and yet here was this lovely long-limbed man in his bed, not just icing on the cake but an entire spun-sugar fairy castle.

Jack squinched his face up against Norrington’s chest. The commodore did not keep enough sweets in his house and it was a travesty.

“Sorry,” he murmured, just to have something to interrupt his internal musings. “I know you have to work in the morning. If’m bothering you, you should go back to your room.”

“That isn’t what I meant,” said Norrington. He sounded a little hurt and Jack turned to him, kissing him slowly and lazily. Norrington had relaxed by the time he finished.

“You really do hate it here, don’t you?” His voice was small and shy, odd for a man who’d seen Jack at his most uninhibited, the most recent incidence being just a few hours ago. And heavens knew Jack had reduced him to a state of incoherence more times than he could count. Perhaps it was lingering awkwardness from the afternoon with the Turners, in which Norrington had struggled mightily to pretend that what was going on between them was not, in fact, going on. Jack hadn’t bothered; Elizabeth already knew, and Will was so deliriously happy that pirate could’ve ravished commodore right in front of him and the boy wouldn’t have noticed a thing. His little touches and assaults of bedroom eyes had left Norrington sitting stiffly beside him, glowering with irritation. It was still such fun to drive him mad.

Jack realized that he hadn’t answered the question. He thought a moment longer; he had already offended Norrington once tonight, albeit unintentionally, and he didn’t mean to do it again.

“It feels...like a cage,” he finally said, trying to sketch an illustration in the air with one hand. “All these solid walls around me, they make it hard to breathe. I can ignore it most of the time, but there’s moments when it presses down like a weight. I need...” He paused, heaving a sigh against the hand caressing his cheek. “I miss the sea.”

Norrington sat up suddenly and started to dress. Jack rolled his eyes, wondering what he could possibly have done now.

“Let’s go,” said Norringon briskly, pulling on his breeches and tossing Jack’s discarded clothing at him.

“Where might we be going?” Jack asked, mystified.

Norrington turned around to look at him. His smile was just barely visible out of the bedroom’s shadows. “We’re going for a swim.”

~~~

“I’m not sure it’s healthy for you, actually –”

“This was your idea!”

“Yes,” said Norrington, looking out at the small cove a half-mile away from his home, “but often my ideas are quite bad. I’ve no aptitude for spontaneity.”

Jack began to rapidly strip off his clothing. “Well, here’s your chance to remedy that.” He tugged at his breeches and Norrington gasped in shock.

“We’re outside!”

“Excuse me, Commodore, but the words ‘let’s go for a swim’ are ringing too loudly in my ears for me to hear your feeble protests.”

“I didn’t mean a naked swim!” Norrington hissed. “Anyone could see us!”

Kicking his clothes aside, Jack swept a hand around the deserted beach. “Gabriel, there is absolutely no one here. No one here!” he shouted to the empty air, making Norrington flinch.

He dipped the toes of one foot in the gentle lap of water against the sand, wiggling them happily. “Perfect,” he pronounced, and proceeded to wade out. He got to where the water was to his knees and flopped forward, submerging totally in the shallow water. It was cool but not cold, and silky in that way totally unique to saltwater. Jack fluttered his limbs in contentment; he had greatly missed just the sensation of being cradled by the ocean. She was his mistress as much as the Pearl and no bathtub could imitate her touch, even with a playful commodore in it to make waves.

Norrington, he saw, was still glancing around anxiously. Jack sighed and splashed him, catching him square on the pristine white breeches and hose he’d pulled on. Norrington jumped out of range with a shout, brushing at his soiled clothing and glaring at Jack.

Jack floated on his back and spat a stream of water into the air.

“You’re all wet now,” he said. “You might as well.” When Norrington still hesitated, he began backstroking out further. “You know,” he called innocently, “I’m feeling a little weakened here. If you don’t swim out and join me, I might drown.”

“It would be an improvement for this island, though I doubt the sealife would thank me for allowing it,” Norrington retorted, but he began tugging off his shoes all the same. Jack treaded water idly and enjoyed the show. By the time Norrington reached him, he had a boyish smile on his face.

Floating again, Jack said smugly, “See now, was that so hard?” Norrington dunked him in response, his hands pushing down on Jack’s belly until he folded in two.

“What was tha’ for?!” Jack spluttered as he came up, lobbing a wall of water at Norrington.

He laughed and returned the splash. “Well, you said you were in danger of drowning, I only wanted to see if you were serious.”

Jack dove under the water and swam in a circle around Norrington, listening as his chuckles slowly faded away. After a pause, he could make out Norrington’s increasingly frantic calls.

“Jack? Jack! This isn’t funny! Sparrow!”

When the burning in his lungs became too much to bear, Jack grabbed Norrington’s arms and yanked him below the surface, slowly enough that he had time to take a breath first. Then he stole that breath from him in an underwater kiss.

Upon resurfacing, they immediately engaged in a silent and furious splashing battle. After a few minutes Norrington gave in, no doubt because the one of them that had been deathly ill was beginning to tire. Jack could feel it in his bones, although he’d never admit to it, and Norrington knew his body well enough by now to be able to tell. Still, in Jack’s opinion, a victory was a victory. He also caught himself giggling and was appalled. Captain Jack Sparrow did not giggle. He might laugh, he might snicker, he might even indulge in the occasional cackle or guffaw, but he did not giggle. The same went for Commodore Gabriel Norrington and yet there they were, romping about a deserted Jamaican beach in the middle of the night and giggling until they had barely enough energy to tread water.

Jack didn’t spend a great deal of time pondering his lot in life. Luck or none, fate or no, you got what you got, you went from there, and it was a waste of time to measure out worth on some universal scale. Still, there were the few occasions he would pause to appreciate, wondering what he’d done to deserve such a turn but not really caring because the important thing was that he’d gotten it. And Jack had gotten Norrington, gotten him well and truly, and he was glad.

Presently Norrington suggested they head in. Jack refused, even though his recuperating muscles were rubbery with exhaustion, in the hopes that Norrington would insist on manhandling him back to shore. He was not disappointed, though Norrington complained about hauling his dead weight all the way back. They collapsed on dry land next to the neat pile Norrington had made of their clothing, lying side by side with their arms just barely touching, gazing up at the stars.

“Dark tonight,” Norrington murmured. “Moon’s behind the clouds.”

“See, there you go again,” said Jack, rolling his eyes. “We’re having this nice moment and you have to complain. Tell me that this isn’t the most beautiful night you’ve ever seen. Tell me you don’t feel part of somethin’ larger, even if that something’s just you and me.”

Norrington’s only reply was to turn his head to look at Jack, so close that Jack could feel his warm breath. He was always warm, giving off heat like a brazier, compelling Jack to stick close to his body even when he wasn’t interested in wrangling those sweet moans and cries from it. The stare made him a bit uncomfortable, though, so he kept his gaze on the sky, taking Norrington’s left hand in his right and tracing imaginary constellations in the sky with a long forefinger. “Think of where you’d be if you were living in England right now. It’d be so dull and – and ordinary.”

“I’d probably be married,” said Norrington thoughtfully.

“In a great white mansion, with eight little bratlings running through the halls.”

Norrington laughed. “I’m only thirty. This rhetorical incarnation of me must be a busy man.”

“You married young,” said Jack sagely. “And there was a set of twins.”

“Ah, that explains it.” He rested his forehead against Jack’s cheek, kissing his shoulder. “And you, where would you be if you weren’t here?”

Jack shrugged, the movement knocking Norrington’s lips against his skin again. “Dunno. Probably dead, if I grew to a man in the same place I was a boy. Might have made it out, except where would I go beyond the docks? Docks are where the boats go, and sailin’s all I ever wanted to do, so I never wanted to leave the docks – at least not by way of land.”

“Really? You knew when you were young?”

“Aye, I always knew the sea was in my blood. I’d ask you, judging by your line of work, didn’t you know it too?”

Norrington stiffened just slightly. “I joined the Navy to please my father.”

Jack craned his neck to stare at him incredulously. “But you never felt that desire to cross the great blue – to see what was beyond the horizon? To make the world your own?” All the things he’d seen in Norrington’s arms – the heights he’d reached – he had just assumed that he’d found a kindred soul, buried though it was beneath brocade and duty.

“No,” said Norrington softly. “I never felt it. Not then. But now...now I feel it when I look at you, and sometimes even when I’m alone, when I was on the Dauntless this last time - the freedom you crave.” His words came out in a breathless tangle and Jack knew he’d spent some time thinking about them. “I touch you and I feel it because you feel it. And I think that...that I’ll feel it forever now. Because of you.”

Jack’s eyes drifted back to the stars. His body was still, but blind panic was ringing through his every nerve.

Norrington was leaning over him, fingertips gentle against his jaw. “Jack?”

He was about to say the words neither of them could possibly allow him to say – Jack knew it was so, with a certainty that frightened him. He put a hand to the back of Norrington’s head and kissed him deeply, rolling over and pressing him down into the sand, hoping fervently that the moment and the danger would pass. When their lips broke apart, something in Norrington was different. Although his voice as he whispered, “You’re shivering, are you chilled? We’d better get back,” was exactly the same, Jack knew that he had changed on some fundamental level, and that it had been Jack who’d forced him to it, in that moment when he had not let him speak.

The words ‘I’m sorry’ came quickly to his tongue, but he bit them back, allowing Norrington to pull him to his feet. They dressed in silence and returned to the house the same way they’d walked down, clinging close enough to trip over one another’s feet, before falling together into Norrington’s bed.

And Jack knew that not only had he lost something that night on the beach, he’d actually thrown it away. He would not let himself mourn it. There was no room for regret in the lives of pirates, but it was doubly true for pirates who were foolish enough to fall in love when they knew better.


17.

He woke in the small hours of the morning, when the sky was no longer pin-pricked black velvet but not yet soaked in the rose and pale blues brought by sunrise. Instead it was a dull gray, like unpolished gunmetal, like the London skyline just before it rained.

Jack’s skin was nearly colorless in this light. In sleep he looked unformed, neither the silk-tongued wraith moving with him in shades of night and moonlight and desire, nor the roguish fool who’d tumbled him down with laughter time and again. He was not the pirate unconsciously checking every entrance and exit when he came into a room, the sallow-skinned invalid asking for water, the unwavering friend consoling a frightened young couple, the surprise of a romantic gifting him with a new pet. He was only a man, breathing deeply and sighing now and then as he slept with an arm around Norrington’s waist.

But on the beach he had been more. In the star-sparkled waters he had slipped away and back again, until Norrington was not sure if he was being met as an equal in element or if Jack was merely letting himself be caught. He’d chosen, wisely or no, to believe the first. Jack was pulling him in, pulling him under, and for once he’d followed with his arms outstretched -- reaching, grasping -- and his eyes closed.

Trusting a man who by definition could not be trusted, because his heart was not his own. Norrington had seen that last night, engaged in mock battle with Jack as the waves brought them near and pulled them apart again. There was no reason to resent him, but there was an ocean of reasons for sorrow. The Turners’ child had been born and Jack had no further reason to stay.

He turned onto his side, brushing fingertips against the lips he’d kissed so many times that they melted against him in his dreams. Jack didn’t stir.

“I wish I could keep you,” he whispered, stroking the knobby back of Jack’s hand on his ribs. “I wish we could be enough for each other.”

Eyelashes nearly as long and lush as a woman’s quivered open, unveiling dark eyes fuzzy with sleep. “Wha’?”

“Nothing,” Norrington said. “I was thinking about wishes. Go back to sleep.”

Jack brought his arms in close to his body and tucked his head under Norrington’s chin. “‘F wishes were ships.”

“I thought they were supposed to be horses?”

Jack shook his head with sleepy confidence, nestling against him. “Nah. Ships.”

Norrington supposed he was right. Things would be so much easier if wishes were horses rather than ships.

He left Jack snoring softly, rolled over into the warm spot and the pillow smelling of commodore. The thought of going to work made something ache behind his eyes, but that was what he had, wasn’t it? That was what he would be left with, so he might as well get readjusted to the concept.

In a way the neat order and precision of proceedings at the fort became a relief, as long as he didn’t think too much on what awaited him at home. He signed papers, read dispatches, and tried to feel useful to the world. When Gillette came by with a report that a local tavern owner was running an illegal gambling ring and possibly involved in smuggling, he was eager to snatch up his coat and walk through town to investigate.

The man’s wife met them at the bar, looking more and more guilty as they questioned her until she let them into a back room. Barnes the suspect was there, as were a few men of low status and a pretty blond barmaid trying to coax a recalcitrant man into letting her sit in his lap. She screamed when they barged in, but Norrington was staring at the object of her flirtation, blood rushing so quickly through his head that he scarcely heard a thing.

Jack’s eyes were shadowed in the low-burning candlelight of the hidden den, but Norrington thought he saw a wince in them. Other than that, Jack did not move.

The noise of mingled outrage and triumph came from beside him. Gillette cocked his pistol at Jack’s head.

“Why on earth would you come back here, Sparrow?” he snapped.

Jack didn’t take his eyes away from Norrington. They asked for nothing. They admitted nothing. “Well, I had such a lovely stay last time, Mr. Gillette, and I thought to further extend my tour of your little town’s amenities.”

Cold was pouring down his spine as surely as if a bucket of ice water had been upended over his head. He had to flex his fingers to ease the numbness.

“Sir?” Gillette was saying. He sounded very far away. “Shall I arrest this man?” His tone indicated that he thought the pirate was anything but.

He had to swallow several times, tasting thick bile at the back of his throat, before he could answer. “Yes.” His voice, to his own distant surprise, was steady.

Jack did not try to run or reach for the weapons he was now carrying. He held his hands out exactly as he had done once before, an offering made to Norrington rather than to the men who were actually cuffing him. His arms were twisted around behind his back, but he did not flinch at the sharp pulls on his shoulders.

It was an effort of sheer will to turn away from that immobile gaze to deal with the tavern owner, but Norrington managed it, feeling Jack’s eyes bore through him. In minutes the culprits were secured. Jack was the first marched out, Gillette pulling him by the elbow.

He looked away as he passed Norrington, but it was not a rebuke. His eyes simply moved with his body when it was turned, leaving Norrington to stare at the back of his head.

Giving instructions to take the prisoners to the jail, he left his men to duck behind a corner and vomit into a pig trough.