Chapter Text
“I must say, Clara, that is without a doubt the most beautiful sight I’ve ever seen.”
Jack’s dark eyes sparkled as he smirked up at me from where his head lay heavy against the pillow, his tawny skin and tapestry of tattoos and scars seeming to come to life beneath the touch of my fingertips.
He was sprawled across our bed — a glorious, mahogany-clawed thing that managed to withstand the ever-present rock and tilt of the room around us — one hand behind his head and the other draped lazily over my bare thigh. I sat straddled over him, wearing nothing but an oversized white muslin shirt that slipped off of my shoulder — well, that and a half-glare-half-grin — for as lovely as the compliment was, I knew full well what he was actually referring to.
“That might make most women swoon, Captain Sparrow,” I replied wryly. “But I know you far too well to think it’s directed toward me.”
My eyes rolled up to point to the golden, jewel-studded crown that balanced lopsided on my salt-thick, sun-bleached waves.
“Well,” he growled, his mischievous grin widening as the glint of the gold seemed to reflect in his eyes. “It’s a very pretty crown.”
When Jack and I had sailed out of Port Royal and begun our second age in command of the Black Pearl, our first stop had, of course, been Isla de Muerta. Being the seasoned professional crew that we were, we kept our child-like, greedy frolicking amongst the gold to an absolute minimum — it couldn’t have been more than four hours, tops — before cataloging the entire haul, making sure each sailor got their fair share. And there had sat the crown, just as I’d left it, perched on a gold-plated column — the symbol of my return to sea. The last time we’d been in that cave, so many strange, painful, incredible things had happened, and Jack and I had kissed for what we believed could’ve been the last time. And here, we had returned to it, side by side, with time stretching ahead of us like a fresh page ready for a million stories. We’d stocked our store, filled our pockets, and left the rest to stay hidden in the caves, effectively making it our crew’s new hideout — and stash.
When we were sure the crew felt satisfied with our ship’s arrangements, we dropped them off in Tortuga to enjoy their hauls and Jack had taken me to our second stop: to Dominica, to visit the grave of my long-lost daughter, Winnie.
I hadn’t been to visit her in many, many years — a fact I carried a potent guilt about, which Jack quickly soothed with a somber but encouraging, “Life’s long, darling. Death’s even longer. She wouldn’t begrudge you a minute, a year, or a decade from heaven.”
The fact is, I hadn’t had the means to travel. When I had fled the Pearl all those years ago upon finding myself pregnant, I had initially sought to build a life with the man who had fathered the child — a handsome, yet rather bone-headed young cobbler in Nassau — but when he had made it explicitly clear he had wanted nothing to do with myself, nor the child, I had used what little I had to cross to Dominica. There, I gave birth, and for one strange, beautiful day, I was Winnie’s mother. And then, when she died, and I found myself sick with grief and physically ragged from childbirth, I had found myself quite alone — and near penniless. It was in Dominica where I spent the last of my money on a plot for Winnie, and after a long, lonely goodbye, I had bartered passage to Port Royal, where I met the Governor, met Elizabeth, and the next chapter of my life had begun.
When Jack and I arrived at the cemetery, I found myself blanching at the gates. Winnie’s grave was unmarked — I had only had the money for a small, plain little stone — but I knew exactly where it was.
“There,” I murmured as we approached the shady corner where I had laid her to rest all those years ago. “There she is.”
He squeezed my hand and gently released it, allowing me to kneel down before the little stone and run my hands through the overgrown grass before it.
“Hello, darling,” I found myself murmuring aloud, tears beginning to spill down my cheeks.
I sat there for a long while, just thinking, crying, closing my eyes and feeling things I’d spent years shoving down. Jack waited patiently, hanging back and leaning against a large mahogany tree and allowing me to have my time. It wasn’t until my tears slowed, and I turned back to look at him with a deep breath and a red-cheeked, sad little smile, that he stepped forward.
“Want to meet her?”
His eyes had lit up, despite the sadness creasing his brow, and he wandered over to kneel down beside me, casting a warm look down at the ground beneath us.
“Hello, Winnie,” he said, his voice gravelly and tender.
I had reached over to take his hand, and he had wrapped his arm around my shoulder and pulled me to lean against him, pressing a kiss against my temple.
That visit had been a gift beyond measure, far more valuable than any amount of swag we could’ve amassed — and something deep within me felt like for the very first time, it was beginning to heal.
To commemorate the visit — or perhaps just to fuse himself to our story in the way he wished he’d always been — Jack left Dominica with a fresh tattoo: the word “winnie” in small, sweet script along the side of his forearm, mingled in with other images and texts that meant enough to him to make permanent on his skin.
I ran my thumb along the name now, smiling softly down at his forearm and feeling a huge rush of affection for him in my chest — a feeling that hadn’t slowed with time. On the contrary — it seemed that every day that passed made me love the man beneath me in our bed even more.
“It suits you, is my point,” Jack rumbled matter-of-factly, his eyebrow cocked as he ran his hand up my thigh, his eyes still exploring the bejeweled crown, glinting in the rays of sunlight slipping through the grand Captain’s Quarters windows. “You look positively regal — fitting for the Pirate Queen of the Spanish Main.”
“I’m nothing of the sort,” I smirked, though the pretend title still sparked a hot little flame of ambition and titillation in my chest. “I think it takes a bit longer than six months to conquer the ocean, Jack.”
“Precisely my point,” he observed. “Only six months and your name already carries a fearsome reputation — all we had to do was walk onto that merchant ship last week and announce who we were, and they handed over every spice in their store.”
“That wasn’t last week, Jack,” I chuckled, rolling my eyes. “That was two months ago.”
“Was it?” he purred, reaching up to playfully tug the strings hanging from my neckline. “Silly me, I must’ve been distracted.”
It was true, much as I hated to admit it — in the six months since we’d begun sailing, we hadn’t exactly been as industrious as I’m sure the crew had been expecting. Not only had Jack and I been a little… let’s say consumed by finally having unlimited access to each other, but something had clearly cropped up in his head — some wild-eyed, hair-brained scheme had taken root, I could see it. He wouldn’t elaborate to me, but we constantly found ourselves heading for strange, thrilling destinations only to come back empty handed, save for a strange trinket or odd jumble of words that seemed to amount to some sort of clue.
The latest had been a drawing of a key, sourced from a rather dangerous prison break — in and out, mind you — that all of us had stared at in frustrated befuddlement, and Jack had beamed at with a giddy, wide-eyed excitement that told me all this was in service of something — something rather uncanny, I’d guess.
Nevertheless, I could see that while I had plenty of patience and good faith to see where Jack was going, the crew was beginning to grow weary of his nonsense. Sensing impending trouble, I had suggested that we take the crew back to our stash on Isla de Muerta to remind them of our abundance — and distract them with freshly-filled pockets.
“So, not the Pirate Queen of the Spanish Main, then,” he sighed. “I’ll just have this back then, I suppose.”
He reached up to snatch the crown off of my head, causing me to spring into action.
“Aht!” I grabbed his wrist and pinned it down on his chest, holding up a warning finger. Jack smirked. “You should know better than to try and steal treasure from a pirate.”
“I beg your pardon,” he growled, escaping my grasp and running his hands up my thighs. “It seems to me you’ve forgotten the chain of command here, you see—” he tightened his grip on me, making me gasp through my grin. “… I’m the captain on this ship.”
I smirked back.
“You might be the captain on this ship, Sparrow, but I think we both know who the captain is in this room.”
“How dare you. Who’s the one with the hat?”
“Who’s the one with the crown?” I leaned down to brush my nose against his ear and spoke in a low, sly whisper. “Besides. You weren’t saying as much an hour ago when you were telling me, in a rather desperate tone, that you belonged to me.”
He sucked in a breath through his teeth and I felt his hips press up against me between my legs.
“That was in a moment of extreme passion,” he rumbled into my ear. “I’m lucid, now.”
I straightened and looked down at him.
“Have you ever been lucid in your life, Jack Sparrow?”
“Hmm,” he smirked, his palms continuing their journey up underneath my shirt to hold me by the waist. “You know, I really should’ve taken into account exactly how much of our relationship would be a constant struggle for power.”
“Would that have been a deterrent or a selling point?”
“Oh, a selling point, no question.”
I shrieked giddily as he seized my wrists and flipped us so that he was on top of me, pressing my hands into the pillow on either side of my head. The crown clattered as it fell to the floor and rolled across the planks and carpets until it settled against Jack’s trunk.
“Now,” he growled intimately as he began to drop soft, sensual kisses onto my neck. “Perhaps I do belong to you. But this…”
I gasped, unable to keep myself from smiling as he skimmed one hand down my body and let his fingers whisper between my legs.
“Whose is this, then?” He continued his slow, languorous kisses across my chin, my cheek, my temple. “Hmm? Who does this belong to?”
I opened my mouth to his, just about to answer that question — probably several times — when suddenly, there was a loud knock.
We froze, peering over at the large, opulently carved mahogany door.
“Don’t move,” Jack hissed through his teeth. “They can’t see us if we don’t move.”
“Oh, for god’s sake,” I laughed, pushing him off of me.
“No, no—” he stammered, grabbing at my waist. “Nobody’s home! Come back tomorrow!”
I turned in his arms and kissed him quickly before putting my hand on his chest and shoving him back down into bed, where he lay petulantly with a comically put-out scowl.
“Just a moment!” I called, quickly draping myself in a beautiful, voluminous patterned dressing gown that I’d picked up in Cape Town after our last successful pillage.
“Hello, Gibbs,” I smiled magnanimously as I cracked open the door and poked my head through just enough to greet the gruff-but-kind second mate before me. “Need something?”
“Hopin’ to speak to the Captain, Finch,” he said warmly, always softer when he was speaking to me — though I could see that if Jack had answered the door, his tone would’ve been rather different.
“Ah, yes, well—” I began, but I was cut off by a loud thump behind me, followed by a furious grunt. I peeked over my shoulder to see that Jack had fallen out of the bed in his effort to reach for his trousers. I fought an eye roll and grinned back at Gibbs. “He’s indisposed but I’ll tell him to come and find you — unless there’s something I can do?”
There was another loud crash, followed by another groan. This time, the eye roll won.
Gibbs nodded for me to step closer, and I did so, pulling the door closed behind me and leaning in to listen.
“Er,” he began, shifting anxiously. “Not to put too fine a point on it, Finch, but… well, its the crew. They be gettin’ restless.”
“I know,” I conceded, wincing. “I know, Jack has been a bit myopic, and we’ve been a bit…” I trailed off, awkwardly. “But that’s why we’re heading back to the island — I promise you, Gibbs, this stash is enough gold to make everything worth it!”
“Well, that’s just it, Miss,” he grimaced. “We’ve made it, and—”
“Oh, we’ve made it!” I lit up, reaching back to open the door again. “Brilliant, just give me two minutes and we can—”
“We’ve made it,” interjected Gibbs, “and… there be no island.”
I stared at him, baffled.
The door opened behind me and Jack jutted his head out to peer at us.
“What do you mean no island?”
“…Ah. So when you said no island, you meant…”
I looked over at Gibbs, our arms folded as we stood next to each other at the side of the ship, staring dubiously at where Jack stood knee-deep in the choppy, grey-blue waters, pacing back and forth on what appeared to be the very tip of volcanic rock that had once been the highest point of Isla de Muerta.
He looked comically surreal, flailing about in the middle of what appeared to be wide-open sea, splashing the water from side to side as though he could uncover the island with his bare hands.
“Aye,” Gibbs growled. “Quite literally, Finch.”
Jack roared a litany of curses and incomprehensible raging.
“I don’t understand,” said Anamaria, coming to my side and looking utterly furious. “How does an island just… sink?”
“The curse,” rumbled Gibbs, his eyes widening. “The gods must’ve struck it down for all it’s dark energy.”
“That,” I mused, raising an eyebrow, “or Jack nettled an especially powerful sea witch and is now paying the price.”
I turned around to the crew and raised my voice above the waves — and Jack’s ranting.
“Not to worry! We didn’t lose so much!” It was a lie, but the pained look in everyone’s eyes meant the truth would be quite out of the question. “And we are a crew to be reckoned with — there are plenty of brilliant heists to be had!”
“Jack!” Gibbs called to his friend. “Captain! Perhaps trying to dig up the island isn’t the best course of action!”
“And that particularly astute piece of wisdom is why you’re second mate,” grumbled Anamaria with good-natured sarcasm, clapping Gibbs on the shoulder and walking away from the scene before she lost her temper fully.
We managed to coax Jack back onto the ship, and for a moment, he stared out at where the island had once been, stormy-eyed and silent. Then, he abruptly turned back to face us and clapped his hands, his eyebrows raised to the heavens.
“Right,” he grinned, slightly manic. “Seeing as the sea has decided to swallow up our bountiful abundance, the next course of action is to begin amassing a brand new, far superior trove, which we will be storing in a water-tight, dry-land location soon to be determined, savvy?”
The crew stared back at him.
“Braac! Shiver me timbers!” squawked Cotton’s parrot.
“That’s the spirit,” nodded Jack, pointing nimbly at the bird.
“And where exactly do you propose we begin this quest, Captain?” asked Gibbs, trepidatiously.
Jack flailed with a drunken sway, opening his mouth to speak and pausing for a moment, before turning to me and clearing his throat.
“Ahem. Finch?”
“Well, we discussed investigating the merchant shipwrecks off the coast of Hispaniola — the ones they say the mermaids are guarding, but—”
“Exactly! Hispaniola!” Jack roared, grinning once more. “Been eons since we’ve been to Hispaniola — lovely food there, mind you — right! Get to work, you layabout swabbers!”
With fresh motivation, the crew leapt into action, hurrying to ready the ship for speedy travel. Jack picked up a bundle of ropes at his feet and tossed them into my arms before making to stride past me toward the ship’s wheel.
“’But’!”
At the sound of my harsh bark, Jack wheeled around and furrowed his brow, pulling a face.
“Rather unappealing language for a lady, don’t you think?”
“’But’, Jack, did you not hear me say ‘but’?” I glared at him.
He looked baffled, then offended, then deeply suspicious.
“Do you know what today is?” I asked pointedly.
“’Course I do,” he replied quickly, his voice brash and authoritative. “The day I make it to Hispaniola in record time.”
I whacked him in the arm with the bundle of rope. He looked affronted.
“It’s March the twenty-first, Jack.”
He blinked back at me.
“It’s not your birthday,” he said defensively, his mind racing to catch up. “I know that for a fact, so don’t try and tell me it is!”
“March the twenty-first, which means that we have two days to get back to Port Royal or we will miss the nuptials of one William Turner and one Elizabeth Swann, and if you think I’m going to allow that, well then you’re just as mad as everyone says you are.”
“Right,” he mused, nodding. “When in fact I am of course—”
“—far madder,” we said together.
“Yes,” he continued, looking thoughtful and regretful. “That does put the proverbial spanner into the proverbial works.”
“I’m not missing that wedding, Jack.”
“Clara, you know how much I love weddings—”
“I do.”
“And you know how deeply my affection runs for your darling charge and her handsome-yet-obscenely-uptight fiancé—”
“I do.”
“But is it wise?” He wrapped his hands around my shoulders and steered me off to the side, his dark eyes flicking between mine with a hushed sort of earnestness. “Going back there… the last time we were there—”
“Yes, I know,” I nodded, begrudgingly understanding. “Things were rather on the neck-breaky side for you, I know — which is why I insisted I would go alone! Just drop me off at a more isolated beach, I’ll slip into the wedding in disguise, embrace the bride quickly, and be back on the ship in no time at all!”
“You seem to forget, love,” he rumbled, still looking grave, “that you, also, were one dainty footstep away from the noose yourself.”
I swallowed, looking up at him and letting out a resigned breath.
“Jack, I would never ask you to put yourself in danger.” I reached up and cupped his cheek, stroking my thumb across the line of his cheek. “I nearly lost you then, and the idea of repeating that risk feels utterly impossible. I do love you, after all,” I murmured wryly, lowering my voice and leaning up closer to him.
The corners of his lips curled up ever so slightly, and he let his hands sweep fondly down to hold me by my arms.
“But I promised Elizabeth,” I continued, looking at him pleadingly. “I have to be there. I know it’s a risk, but it’s one I have to take.”
His mouth folded into a straight line, and his chest deflated.
“Alright,” he conceded, wearily. “Very well. We shall go to Port Royal. And you shall go to the wedding alone.” He picked up my hand and peered over it into my eyes, pointedly. “And I shall accompany you.”
With a quick kiss dropped on the back of my hand, he strode over to the wheel and bellowed to the crew.
“Slight change in coordinates! Instead of going that way,” he shouted, gesturing out to the ocean before us, “we are now going that way.”
He squinted one eye and shifted his arm about three degrees to the left. I chuckled, despite myself — I was always in awe of how adept he was at sea. How he could configure himself in the waves and fog without so much as a star chart or a sextant.
I strode up to stand beside him, folding my hands behind my back.
“You really are impossible, you know that?” I murmured to him, unable to bite back my smirk.
“Sticks and stones, Finch,” he rumbled, whipping out his compass and peering down at it with an amused eyebrow raise, before returning his gaze to meet mine and tossing me a wink. He lowered his voice to a conspiratorial, confessional rumble that no one else could hear, and cast me a snuck glance with affection glimmering in his eye. “I do love you, after all.”