More FIC: Hard Hearts (two more chapters)

James had initially remained below, trying to calm his singing nerves. He wasn’t sure what he had expected when he was sent to wake her, but what had occurred was far from anything he could have conceived. Adrenaline coursed through him to the point where he barely felt the two wounds her blades had given him. My god, he thought to himself. My god, but she is quick. The way she’d leapt from the bed...there was no warning. He touched her, and she sprang as if she was pure coiled energy, like a snake waiting to strike.

No, not like a snake. Not cold-blooded. She was feral fire. He found himself remembering a jungle cat he’d seen years ago in the Tower Menagerie. The tiger had lain docile and sleeping in the cage, until a warder—determined to put on a show for the crowd, no doubt—had prodded it with a staff. The animal moved like lightening, throwing itself against the bars so hard the metal clanged with the impact. The warder was not able to move out of the way fast enough, and he suffered a mauled arm. James had laughed at the man at the time; now, as he tore a strip of linen from his shirt in order to bind his bleeding hand, he felt considerably more empathetic.

James ascended the stairs to the deck. She was already above, and she turned to look at him. He met her gaze and did not waver, staring her down until she turned away. Sparrow approached him, noticing both wounds, and called the woman back, insisting she be the one to tend those wounds. James tried to argue, but it was to no avail. Like it or not, Sparrow was captain here, and they were both subject to his orders.

So James did as he was bid, albeit with some trepidation. He half expected the woman to take him back below decks and make good on her promise to cut his throat, her captain’s orders be damned. But no—he watched her crouch near a box, from which she pulled assorted bandages and what passed for medical supplies on board. She sat, rum bottle between her legs, and looked up at him. “Well?”

“What?” he asked, stupidly.

“Fine,” she said, starting to stand. “Bleed to death.”

James put out a hand to stop her. “No, thank you.” He sat across from her.

“Take off your jacket.” He did; she handed him the bottle. “Have yourself a good swallow, Commodore. Other hand, you fool! I need to see the wound.”

James switched hands and took a drink, bracing himself for pain. He was certain she’d make this hurt. To his surprise, however, her touch was practiced and gentle as she unwound the rag he’d bound his hand with and appraised the cut. Then she took another bottle, pulled the cork with her teeth, and poured liquid onto his hand. The seawater burned, but he set his jaw and didn’t make a sound.

She looked up and raised an eyebrow. “Problem, Commodore?”

“I told you already,” he said carefully, refusing to show any pain “It’s James. The only problem seems to be with your ears.”

She had been carefully dabbing at the wound but now, in reply to his comment, she pressed down with a vicious grin. This time, he nearly jerked his hand out of her grip, but she held it in place. She fluttered her eyelashes at him. “So sorry, James. I slipped.” He glared at her, but kept his peace.

She wrapped his hand in clean bandages, then moved closer in silence. She looked at the cut on his arm through the tear in his dirty shirt. “Take it off,” she said.

“Pardon?” James said, feeling like an idiot as soon as the word left his mouth. He closed his eyes for a moment to compose himself. “I’m sorry but I don’t think…”

She interrupted him immediately. “This isn’t a parlor, Comm…James. I can’t tend the cut with that shirt on, and Jack—for reasons I cannot fathom—wants you tended to. If it were up to me, I’d be happy to let you keep the filthy thing on, let it sit against the open wound, and watch your suffer when the gangrene set in. However, since it is not up to me, take off the shirt.”  When he still didn’t, she tried a different route. She lowered her eyelids and looked up at him through her lashes. Her mouth formed a seductive smile as she leaned in close. “Don’t worry,” she purred into his ear as her hand reached for the lacing on the shirt. “You’re not my first…patient.” James moved away fast; she laughed at his blush. 

James composed himself and moved back to where he had been a moment ago, before she’d changed tactics. It was an effective move, he admitted to himself, and he wondered how often she’d used it in the past, and to what end. Bloody Delilah, James thought to himself as he stripped off shirt and threw it to the side, determined not to let her unnerve him again. It was ridiculous, he reasoned, that she unnerved him at all, since she’d essentially attempted to murder him a few moments ago. He held himself still while she cleaned the cut on his arm, determined not to look at her.

“It’s not deep. You’re faster than I would have thought,” she said, with something akin to a compliment in her tone.

“Training,” he responded.

She grunted. “The sainted Navy.”

“They trained me well,” he said. He turned back to her, a look of serious consideration on his face. “But not you.”

“I wouldn’t join that pack of duplicitous bastards even if they would have me.” She tied the bandage around his arm, then sat back and took the bottle from him. “I’d sooner trust a pack of cutthroats.”

“And so you do,” he said, donning his shirt and jacket again. “It would seem.” He took the bottle back and drank. “You learned from the cutthroats, then?”

“First off,” she said, taking the bottle out of his hand. “Insult this crew again at your peril. Second, find your own bottle – I’m done doctoring. And third, who trained me, and where and why, is none of your concern.” She drank deeply.

James was not going to let her end the conversation so easily. “It would seem your captain desires some kind of reasonable companionship between us. I would so hate to disappoint him.” He held out his hand. “So I’d be very much obliged if you would at least pretend to take part in this conversation by answering my question, and kindly hand me the bottle while doing so.”

“What a greedy boy you are.” She smiled. It was not friendly. “You want rum, you want conversation, and you want answers. Tell me, greedy James, are you a gambling man?”

“Games of chance?” he asked. “I don’t find them amusing, I am afraid.”

“A game of chance,” she said, standing. She beckoned him to follow; curiosity piqued, he did. “And a prize of truths.” She continued drinking as she walked. “A simple game, played with dice. Three rolls each round; high number of the three wins the round.”

“Wins what?” They were back among the crew now.

“Let’s call it a game of truths.” She moved toward Jack, who was observing the two of them closely. “A question asked and an honest answer given for each win.”

“And who will attest to these truths?” James found an unclaimed bottle of rum and took it for his own.

Jane stood next to Jack, her hand on his shoulder and his arm around her waist. She whispered something in his ear; the pirate smiled and answered for her. “I’ll back her,” he said. “Mr. Gibbs, a table and dice. Who backs you, Norrington?”

A makeshift table was set up, a wide plank over a crate, two more crates for chairs. James had more rum, thinking. Then he saw Elizabeth and called her over. The two shared a brief and quiet conversation before he turned back and answered Jack. “Miss Swann will back me.

Jack looked at Elizabeth. “Isn’t that charming, assisting your former fiancé. You understand the game?  It’s simple, really—the dice roll, the numbers tally. The high score wins the right to ask a question and receive a true response. Savvy?”

Elizabeth nodded. “Savvy.”

“The game begins, then.” Jack smiled.

James and Jane took their seats across from the other. Gibbs handed dice to Jane, who shook them in her hand. “Ladies first,” the old sailor said. James nodded.

The dice were thrown, each taking their turn. Jane won the first round handily. “My victory,” she said. “My question.” She glanced at Elizabeth, then back at James. “How sweet the two of you are, though no longer affianced. So tell me, James, was it true love or ambitious politics?”

James narrowed his eyes at Jane. She was wasting no time, it seemed, her first question placed to embarrass both him and Elizabeth. But she’d won, and he’d play fair. “I was once foolish enough to think it love, and I further fooled myself into believing arranging what I saw as a wise match would bring love eventually to me,” he said, choosing his words carefully. “But time and circumstances have proved the former incorrect and the latter ill-advised.” He took the dice. “My roll.” This time, James took the round. “Your captain,” he said to Jane. “Do you share space below decks as well as above?”

Jane leaned against Jack’s legs. She reached back, snaked an arm around his waist. In response, he ran a hand through her hair and trailed a finger along her jawline. Jane smiled, eyes on James. “We share space everywhere, my Jacky and I.”

Like bollocks, she’s not his woman, James thought to himself, annoyed. He crossed his arms. “That’s not an answer.”

“Aye, ‘tis,” Gibbs said. “Everyone shares space, both above and below, so her response was honest, according to the rules and your question. Make your question more specific, next time. Subtleties get you no where in this game.”

James nodded—he understood now. The game continued and he won again. “Specifics,” he mused. “How did you come to crew with Sparrow?”

“He found me,” Jane said. “In a tavern in Tortuga. There was a brawl—as usual—and he was in a rather tricky spot. I got him out of it, and got us both the hell out of there. He owed me, and I collected immediately. We sailed that night.” James looked at Jack, who nodded in affirmation, then Jane held out her hand. “My roll.”

The game continued. James was winning more often than not, and he learned quickly to make his questions very pointed. As a result, Jane had no choice but to tell him where she was from (the south of England), how long she’d been a pirate (near a decade), what other ships she’d crewed on (“Large ones” had been her response, and James had to accept it), and what other jobs she’d worked before going to sea (barmaid, lady’s maid, and fortune teller). James, in turn, told her why he was no longer Commodore (he resigned his post after failing to catch Sparrow) and why he entered the Navy (he was the youngest of three and it seemed a good prospect).  And so the game, and the drinking, continued.
******

I was drunk; I could feel it. Not that anyone would know, of course, as I’d long ago learned how to be drunk without looking it. He was drinking too, at a faster rate than I, but he had either learned similar tricks or he was simply a better drinker. I doubted the latter. He’d won the last few rolls, learned more about me than I would have liked, but finally the dice landed in my favor. About time, too, as I was getting tired of playing nice. “So tell me,” I said. “How does it feel to be a broken man?”

He smirked and held up his rum bottle. “Hurts less with every passing moment.”

I looked to Jack and Gibbs, who both shook their heads, then I looked to Elizabeth, who reluctantly did the same. “It’s agreed that’s no answer. Try again,” I told him.

“It was terrible, at first,” he admitted. “It felt like everything I had ever wanted and ever believed in was ripped out from under me, and nothing that I did could get it back. Which didn’t stop me from trying everything anyway, to the exclusion of all common sense and sense of self-preservation. And when that one obsessive goal proved far too crafty and elusive”—he toasted Jack in an exaggerated manner—“I gave up. On everything. From time to time, it still stings. But I’ve learned to live with it.”

I let out a short laugh, waving a hand at his rum bottle. “Right. And a bang-up job you’re doing, too. Your roll.”

He won again. “You’ve had an education,” he said. “And not just on ships. Your accent and your manner of speaking betray you. Why were you educated?”

I glared at him. Clever bastard. Why, he’d asked. Where would have been too easy, along with by whom. But why merited a real answer. I had a drink before I gave it to him. “My parents wanted me to have more,” I said. “More than they had, more than their parents had before them. My father in particular believed an education would end with me better placed for marriage prospects, since the meager dowry he would have been able to provide certainly wouldn’t have been enough. He paid tutors to come to our home or to give me lessons in their homes, paid them privately in goods as well as money, since the local school wouldn’t have me. And my mother arranged for elocution and what refinements she could pass along. I took to the books easily, and I still read whatever I can get my hands on, as Jack can attest. My knowledge of subjects both obscure and common has gotten him and a number of others out of more than one tight spot. And my mother would be proud to know that the finishing lessons have managed to come in handy on occasion—put me in a stolen gown and I can play the lady better than some born to the title. I reckon you’d be amazed, James,” I leaned forward, licking my lips and giving him a wicked smile. “At how well I can clean myself up, should the occasion call for it. I’d give your Elizabeth a run for her money, I reckon. So you’ll let me know if you require an…escort, won’t you?”

There was hunger in his eyes, but I couldn’t figure why—had I indeed planted wicked thoughts into the once-noble mind or was more knowledge his only desire? Difficult to tell, at the moment, but quite possibly a good deal of fun, either way. I reached for the dice, just barely sliding my fingertips along the palm of his hand before I took the bones and let them roll. But when he took the dice he beat me again. I cursed, and he smirked at me. “An escort, perhaps. But not a gambling partner. So you had an education and apparently parents, and yet you found yourself working in a tavern in Tortuga, among the rabble and the wretched.” He drank from his bottle. “I can say that, you see, being one of them myself. How did you find yourself there, one cannot help but wonder.”

I stiffened, then felt Jack’s hand on my shoulder for a brief second. It was enough. “I lost my parents suddenly. There was an accident, and there was no money. I was sent to a workhouse, which I didn’t enjoy, so I ran away at the earliest opportunity. I made my way, without”—I gave him a pointed look—“without selling anything I already possessed. You know the occupations I attempted, none of which took. The tavern in Tortuga was just as much opportunity as anything else, perhaps more so, since it eventually landed me here.”

“I’d hardly call this an opportunity,” he scoffed.

“Well,” I said. “You can have yourself a good think on that tomorrow, when you are again scrubbing the deck and I am dining with the Captain. My roll.” This time I won. “You let Jack go, lo those many months ago, when you could easily have had his neck in the noose. Such a simple thing to do, really, but it cost you dearly. Why did you do it? No need to ask if you regret it, now. I reckon that’s quite clear.”

He shot a dark look at Elizabeth, who turned immediately from his gaze. “Perhaps it was a misplaced wedding present,” he said in a bitter voice. “In truth, I have no idea why I let him go, and I’ve obviously, as you were so kind to point out, had cause to regret the decision. I may have believed I was doing the right thing at the time, or perhaps it was something else. A man who thinks he is in love will do strange things and make bad decisions.”

I looked to Elizabeth; the girl was staring pointedly at the floor. Now it was my turn to smirk. “Bad decisions indeed. One of the many reasons I prefer lust.” Jack and the pirates laughed as I toasted them with my bottle, “Here’s to lust, my favorite of the deadly sins, eh boys?” When the bones rolled, I won again. “The seven deadly sins. What’s your acquaintance with them all, Mister Norrington, James the no longer betrothed, James of the dirty coat, our new green-eyed lad?” Yes. I was drunk.

To my surprise, he smiled. Wickedly. “Let’s list them, shall we, Jane of the wicked knives and even sharper tongue, dark-eyed mistress of the Pearl. No Man’s Jane.” Good. He was drunk too. He began counting the sins on his fingers. ‘Pride, from which all sins arise. I think it’s safe to say I’ve embraced that one, chasing one blasted pirate halfway around the globe despite everyone in my command warning me what a ridiculous and reckless notion it would inevitably turn out to be. Anger, certainly—it’s what likely spurred my enthusiastic embrace of Pride. Gluttony…if it counts with rum, I suppose I’ve embraced that one as well. Sloth has never been an interest, I’m afraid, though my choice of gluttony does often make sleep a necessity. Sometimes at the most unexpected times. Envy.” A glance back at Elizabeth. “Perhaps not as much anymore.” A glance at Jack, then, interestingly, me. “But perhaps, at that. Greed—ambition, certainly. I’ve not managed to completely drown that yet, though I’m presently at a loss as to how to work toward it. And finally Lust.” He drank from the bottle, apparently considering the subject. “But we have reason to cool our raging motions, our carnal stings, our unbitted lusts…”

“Whereof I take this that you call love to be a sect or scion; it is merely a lust of the blood and a permission of the will,” I finished for him. “Shakespeare. Othello, if I am not mistaken. And you do not strike me as a man who would fall prey to such romantic confusions.”

“Indeed?” he asked. “And how do I strike you, then?”

“Desire to know why, and how - curiosity, which is a lust of the mind, that a perseverance of delight in the continued and indefatigable generation of knowledge - exceedeth the short vehemence of any carnal pleasure,” I quoted. “And I don’t believe it was your roll, Mr. Norrington.” I tossed the dice casually in my hand.

“Hobbes, if I am not mistaken,” he said. “Philosophy and literature. An impressive breadth of knowledge for a pirate and former tavern girl. But ‘short vehemence of any carnal pleasure’? How very unfortunate for you.”

“I was referring to you.”

Now, to my surprise, he was the one to lean forward and slowly, caressingly, take the dice from my hand. “Allow me to assure you, madame, that you most certainly were not.” He rolled—an immediate perfect roll. I cursed his luck yet again as he looked up with a smirk. “Will you roll to match me, or would you prefer that I just get straight to it?”

“Mr. Norrington, allow me to assure you—should the time ever come when you and I roll well-matched, you will have no doubt as to what I prefer and what you should get straight to.” I smiled sweetly and fluttered my eyelashes, then sneered, “Now ask your question.”

James was silent for a moment. He looked as if he were trying to solve something; I realized that it was probably me. “You’ve had an education, quite an impressive one, it would seem. You had parents that were not wealthy, but who managed to raise and educate you without sending you off somewhere, so they presumably needed you at home. You spent time—albeit briefly—in a workhouse from which you managed to run away and then find yourself a variety of jobs, all, one assumes, far from the workhouse and anyone who might have been looking for you. Which would have to mean you were on your own, taking care of yourself for some time before you found your Captain and his ship and this wonderful life you’ve carved out for yourself for the past ten years. You couldn’t have been a child when you started all of this; you must have been at or at least nearing adulthood, especially since you mentioned a dowry. Your parents had prospects in mind for you, it’s clear. Do you ever wonder what they would think of you, now? What would they think of all you’ve done with their careful plans, their efforts to educate you, to prepare you for something more? Is this the ‘more’ they had in mind, do you think?”

I pushed away from the table and made to stand. “This game is over.”

Gibbs and Jack both pressed me back to my seat. “D’ye forfeit to him, Janie?” Jack asked. “Let him win?”

My insides felt twisted and I shook my head. “No, I forfeit nothing to him.”

“Then answer.” Jack’s voice was stern, but soft. He knew what this could do to me.

I set my jaw and shook my head again. “That wasn’t one question. It was three. He gets one question.”

James hesitated. He wasn’t a stupid man, and I could see even he knew he’d somehow gone too far. But he was stubborn, and the simple fact was he didn’t have to give a damn about how any question of his would make me feel. Still, he couldn’t quite meet my eyes when he said, “The last one then. Is this life you’ve chosen to lead what they wanted for you?”

“Sometimes choices get taken from us, don’t they? Sometimes we have no control over the very things we thought we’d have the most say in, the very things that meant the most to us – a sentiment you should find familiar, Mr. Norrington. Circumstances we never could have predicted, never could have imagined in our most absurd dreams and nightmares, can come along and throw everything on its head, destroy things, rend our lives to tatters.” The words were coming fast, spilling out of my mouth before I could stop them. “People—people we don’t know or never really considered—have a very bad habit of coming along and ruining things, taking things away. People like blacksmiths,” I spat pointedly and felt grim satisfaction when he winced. “People like soldiers and sailors and The Royal bloody Navy. It’s amazing, isn’t it, Mr. Norrington, how very often the people who are meant to protect us or the people we believe couldn’t possibly hurt us do just that, and all the logic in the world can say they didn’t mean it, it wasn’t ‘on purpose,’ but it doesn’t matter, does it?  It doesn’t matter when weighed against the hurt, the anguish, and the weeping, festering, ragged hole that used to be your heart. Sometimes, Mr. Norrington, the best laid plans fall apart, whether because of a young girl’s romantic notions or a battleship captain who can’t be bothered to watch where he’s going in the harbor of a fishing village. And all the rest of us can do is stare at the wreckage and try not to succumb to despair.” I stood again, so forcibly it sent the crate I had been sitting on flying backward, causing my shipmates to jump out of the way. My motion also upset the makeshift table, knocking over my rum bottle and spilling the sticky liquor all over the wood and my breeches. I blinked hard against tears, looking from Jack to Gibbs to Elizabeth and finally James. “This game is over.”  I walked away.