| [fic] Cursed |
[Jul. 18th, 2007|10:06 pm] |
Hello! I have been toiling away at my very long fic, and upon a recent review, decided to cut a chapter that didn't really work for the story.
However, it does work as a one-shot, so I offer it here now. It's a direct sequel to Chosen Path, and assumes the events of Remove and Shackles, but only in a passing mention, so it isn't really necessary to have read those.
Title: Cursed
Author: FaeriQuene
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 1794
Disclaimer: None of this is mine, and I make no profit.
Summary/notes: "I bear a curse of my own. Everyone who kisses me dies." 2 years after the events of AWE, Elizabeth returns to the Pearl, haunted by memories.
AWE spoilers? Yes.
Cursed
Three nights running, he saw her posed on deck, staring out at the horizon. At first, he let her be; she had only just rejoined the crew, and her life had been very different for two years. Besides, on a crowded ship, everyone could use a little solitude sometimes.
She’d seemed glad enough of his company that first night, though, so on the third night, he decided to try again.
“Captain Barbossa.” She acknowledged him without turning, as he paused just behind her. He leaned on the rail beside her, as he had done several nights earlier. For a time, he let his gaze follow hers, watching her out of the corner of his eye. There was some burden weighing on her mind, but there was no reason to press her. She’d share in time, or she wouldn’t, but it would be on her terms.
“Shouldn’t stay out here alone so late.”
“I can’t sleep.”
“Ye’d be better not sleepin’ somewhere yer not like to fall overboard.”
“I’m fine.” She would have been fine, but two years on land meant her sea legs weren’t what they once were, and the sea was rough this night.
“I mean it, Missy. One strong wave throws you off, nobody notices ‘till morn. Next thing you know, yeh wake up in the locker.”
“Are you forgetting? There’s no locker anymore. I wake up on the Dutchman,” she corrected. “With Will.”
She suddenly looked a little too interested in the black depths below for his liking. “Don’t yeh dare start thinking that way. I didn’t take yeh onto me crew just to lose yeh. ‘Sides, yer lad needs a mother, and damned if I’ll be lookin’ after him without yeh.”
“No!” she started up at him. “No, I would never leave William. It’s just…” her eyes squeezed shut.
He slid his hand across the rail, letting it fall atop hers. “Yeh miss him.”
“I miss him terribly. I miss…so much.” She looked down at his hand covering hers. He let his thumb slide along the side of her palm. It was impossible to deny his awareness of her femininity, her soft flesh beneath his fingers reminding him that it had been a bit too long since he’d last enjoyed a woman’s company.
“Do you know, Captain Barbossa, that you are the first man in over two years to touch me?” He raised a questioning eyebrow, and she smiled. “You are. For two years, no man has touched me. At all. In any capacity.”
Two years without being touched. Not as bad as ten, but he could certainly relate. Though she’d left herself wide open for comment, and, never one to pass up an opening like that, he put on his best “come hither” grin and leaned towards her. “Well, I’d be most happy to touch yeh, in any capacity ye’d like.”
She would have looked scandalized once. Now she simply rolled her eyes in an amusingly familiar manner. “That’s most inappropriate of you.”
He shrugged. “I try.”
“You can’t, though, even if I wanted you to. I’ve got nearly eight more years to wait, then Will comes back. I’ll kiss him, and he’ll die. Again.”
“I thought yeh’d kiss him and he’d return to the living was how the curse was laid out?”
She shook her head stubbornly. “That’s his curse. I bear a curse of my own. Everyone who kisses me dies.”
It was interesting that he’d only mentioned touching, but she’d starting talking of kissing. Though her use of the term “everyone” seemed a bit overdramatic. “Jack and Will? Two don’t make a pattern, Mrs. Turner. Neither of ‘em stayed dead, neither.”
“Sao Feng kissed me, did you know that?” He had not known, but nor was he especially surprised. “I didn’t want him to, but it didn’t matter, because he died. The Dutchman attacked, and it killed him.”
A lucky thing, for her. Sao Feng was not known amongst women to be merciful if they were disinclined to assent to his desires. Elizabeth Swann had been a formidable fighter, but lacked the strength to oppose a man like Feng. “Deserved it if he attacked you. Don’t think on it.”
“James didn’t deserve it.”
“Who be James?”
“Commodore – no, Admiral James Norrington. A British soldier and a good man. He freed me and the crew from the Dutchman. He loved me, once, long ago. He finally kissed me, and then he died. Was killed. Bootstrap killed him, actually.” She was holding the railing, leaning back, eyes blinking furiously.
Four? He was hardly one to judge, but for all that she played the innocent, the lass knew how to entice a man. Captains all, no less. “Three pirate captains and a commodore, eh? Feelin’ a bit left out here, Mrs. Turner.”
“Well, you’ll have to keep feeling that way. I wouldn’t let you kiss me now.”
Not now, but another time she might have? Curious. There had been a time or two in Singapore when he’d thought perhaps she would, but when nothing had come of it, he’d let the matter lie. But now…it might be worth exploring a bit.
“Yeh don’t really think yer cursed, do ye?”
“I - ,” she started, then stopped, looking for the answer on the horizon. “I don’t know, really, what to think.” She turned back to him, jaw set. “But when four men kiss you and die, it is a bit unsettling, wouldn’t you say?”
He sighed. Always one to bear her burdens in silence. Until he happened upon her. He wondered why she chose him to open up to. “There was a war goin’ on. Lotta men died. A few of ‘em happened to have kissed you.” She didn’t look any happier. Girl had a funny habit of believing things were her fault, when she just happened to be there.
He reached out to her, lifting her chin a bit, enjoying the smooth feel of her cheek beneath his thumb. He was about to press his luck here, but he was no pirate if he didn’t try. “If yeh really want proof yer not cursed, well, I promise to behave meself.” He leaned a bit closer and dropped his voice. “One kiss, nothin’ more.”
He wasn’t sure how he expected her to react. Likely she’d get huffy on him again, call him a lecher and storm away. But when she raised her eyes to his, there was some unexpected spark in them. Desire.
“What if you’re wrong?” Her voice trembled, but he could feel her acquiescence nearing. He licked his own lips in anticipation, stepping just a bit closer.
“Been dead. Hasn’t killed me yet.” Closer still. “I’ll take my chances.”
She hadn’t backed away yet – a very good sign. “I suppose it would,” she began slowly, “ease my mind. To know.”
He slid his hand around her head, letting his fingers tangle in her hair as he drew her to him. Her eyelids fluttered shut and he gently pressed his lips to hers.
It had been a long time since he’d kissed a woman without intentions of doing a fair bit more than kissing. It had been rather longer than he cared to admit since he’d kissed a woman full stop, for that matter. And self-restraint was not one of his favored practices, pirate and all.
But she was married to the New Davy Jones, so for her sake, and his own, he tried, tried very hard, to keep the kiss reasonably chaste. The gentleman he fancied himself embracing the lady he wished to court, the lady she might have been. He very nearly succeeded.
He couldn’t have said who broke first. Perhaps he held her a bit too tightly, or opened his mouth a bit too wide, or perhaps it was her tongue darting out and sweeping his lower lip. But suddenly the soft, passionless kiss he’d intended to give her developed into something considerably more heated. He slipped an arm around her waist and pulled her closer, letting his hand slide up and down her back. When he opened his mouth to her questioning tongue, she surprised him by devouring his mouth, sliding her palms up his chest, and clinging to his shoulders. Responding in kind, he swept in to taste her lips, her teeth, her tongue. He couldn’t prevent the guttural moan that escaped his throat, but the sound startled her into realization of what she was doing, and she pulled sharply back.
He released her, leaning against the rail in what he hoped was a casual gesture. She didn’t need to know just how weak his legs were suddenly feeling. He felt a bit better when he noticed she did the same thing.
“Captain,” she gasped, “if that was behaving, I’d hate to see you misbehave!”
He grinned. He left her breathless? Yeh still got it, old boy. “Oh no,” he countered. “Ye’d love it. Every minute.” Her eyes were brimming with curiosity, for all that she denied it. Couldn’t hurt to give her a few more ideas. “If I’m misbehavin’, yer in my cabin,” he stepped around her and stood behind her, placing his hands gently on her shoulders. “And yer naked,” she stiffened a bit, but didn’t shrink from his touch.
“Nothing you haven’t seen before.”
Truth, though he’d have chosen better circumstances. “And I thank ye for the reminder. Where were we? Ahh, yer naked, in me cabin, and yer not leavin’ until yer every need, every desire is fulfilled.”
“My every desire? Surely you meant your – “
“Nay, yeh heard me right. If,” he leaned closer, “I’m misbehavin’, that is. Turn around.” Surprisingly enough, she obeyed. He took one of her hands and slipped it beneath his coat, against his doublet, and held it to his chest. She eyed him suspiciously, but he thought he heard her breath hitch. “What do yeh feel?”
She frowned. “Your heartbeat?”
He smiled back at her. “I didn’t die. Seems yer not cursed after all.”
She became rather interested in the floor. “Perhaps not.”
“Course, yer welcome to prove that to yerself anytime.”
She extracted her hand from his. “Thank you, but I believe I’ll be alright. I think I can sleep now.”
A memory flitted through his mind, and he bowed to her, the gentleman pirate rearing up again. Taking her hand, he raised it gently to his lips. “Milady.” The gesture had had good results in the past, and it proved successful still. The smile with which she favored him made calling upon long-abandoned manners most worthwhile.
“Goodnight, Captain Barbossa.” She nodded at him, and turned away, heading for her bunk below deck. He leaned back to watch her go. He was not such a gentleman that he didn’t enjoy the view.
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