"You'll be king, Sebastian. It'll be easy, Sebastian. Just kill your brother, Sebastian. If I got rid of Prospero, you can get rid of Alonso, Sebastian. Don't be a coward, Sebastian."
"Shut up, Sebastian."
Sebastian quit his pacing, folded his arms across his chest, and dropped to the dungeon floor with a loud thud. "Fuck you, Antonio."
Antonio merely smiled, although Sebastian couldn't see anything remotely amusing about the situation. For a brief moment on the island, it had seemed as though Prospero had forgiven them for his exile and was even going to decline to tell King Alonso about their plot to dispose of him and set the crown on Sebastian's head. But then the re-invested Duke of Milan's conscience had returned—or perhaps he had finally put the picture together and realized that his daughter's beloved was the only thing except for an aging king that stood between a would-be murderer and the throne of Naples. And so as the whole company was readying to make the voyage back to Naples, Prospero had let slip the details of their failed plan into Lady Gonzala's ear, and she had informed King Alonso, and Sebastian and Antonio had been thrown in the brig for a long, dark trip home with the bilge water oozing around their ankles and nothing but stale hardtack to eat. Upon their return to Naples, they had briefly been cleaned up and made to attend Miranda and Ferdinand's wedding. After the ceremony was over, Alonso had informed the entire gathering of their duplicity and promptly shepherded them off to the dungeon, where Gonzala locked them up and informed them they would be staying until further notice.
It had been two days since then, and their guard had been impressively mute when they questioned him about Alonso and Prospero's intentions. Perhaps he had also become vexed at Antonio's sarcastic remarks about his intelligence, since he brought them nothing more than a single loaf of stale bread for dinner.
Sebastian sighed as he picked up the thing that looked disturbingly like a rock. "This is what comes of ambition, Antonio. A cold cell and hard bread."
Yet still Antonio smiled as Sebastian tossed him a chunk of bread. It was only when Sebastian looked down at what remained in his lap that he realized this was probably because he had given Antonio the larger half of the loaf.
"On the contrary, my lord Sebastian," Antonio said, flicking the bread into the air, catching it, and then tossing it up over and over again.
"What's that, my lord Antonio?" Sebastian retorted, cocking an eyebrow. "Do you have some brilliant plan to get us out of here? Does it involve crossing out fingers and hoping the guard magically falls asleep so we can brain him with half a loaf of bread?"
Antonio said nothing. He just kept smiling.
"Oh God. That's actually your plan, isn't it?"
Antonio opened his mouth, but Sebastian cut him off before he could say anything. "Count me out of whatever crazy scheme you're about to butcher. I've had enough."
For the first time since Ferdinand and Miranda's wedding, Antonio's smile wavered. "But, Seb—"
"No." Sebastian swallowed the last of his bread and curled up his side, his back to the ex-Duke of Milan. "Leave me alone, Antonio."
Prison life was not treating Sebastian very well. In the week since they had been locked up, the dank dungeon air had settled in his lungs and left him with a cough that wracked his whole body and a chill that shook him from head to toe.
Antonio sat in the corner of the cell, watching him toss and turn and cry out in his sleep. He seemed to be having nightmares more often than not these days, although he refused to talk to Antonio when he asked about them. Actually, Sebastian had refused to talk to Antonio about pretty much anything over the past few days.
"The devil speaks in him!" Sebastian cried, rolling onto his side and throwing out a hand. "M'lord Prospero, have mercy!"
Of course his dreaming mind was dragging him back to the island. That accursed island, where over the course of a mere three hours Antonio's hopes had been catapulted into the heavens and then come crashing back down to shatter on the cold, hard earth. If only Gonzala hadn't heard that blasted humming. If only Ferdinand hadn't returned from the dead. If only Prospero hadn't reared his bookish head again. If only, if only…
He could have made Sebastian a king. They could have ruled together, Milan and Naples.
Antonio shrugged his jacket off. It was the same jacket he had worn to Claribel's wedding in Tunis, the same jacket he had worn on the island, the same jacket he had worn to Miranda and Ferdinand's wedding, the same jacket he had still been wearing when Adrian and Gonzala had plucked him from the feast and thrown him down into the dungeon.
"Smell how fresh this garment is now, Lady Gonzala," he laughed softly to himself as he draped it over Sebastian's shivering form. "But it will keep you warm, my lord Sebastian. My king."
Sebastian muttered something in his sleep and clutched at the jacket.
"I've gotten us into quite a fix, haven't I?" Antonio mused as he stripped off his shirt, folded it as neatly as he could, and slid it under Sebastian's head. "I'm sorry," he whispered, stroking Sebastian's unkempt brown hair. "I'll get us out of here, I promise."
"You look—" Sebastian broke off as he hunched over for a coughing fit. "—good without a shirt."
"You'd look even better," Antonio grinned.
It took Sebastian a moment to shake the fog of sleep out of his mind and remember that he was supposed to be furious with Antonio for getting him thrown in jail. But just as the anger was rising in his throat again, he felt the weight of Antonio's jacket on his shoulders and saw the goosebumps on the other man's arms.
"Thanks for this," Sebastian said, trying to hand the jacket back to Antonio as he started sneezing violently.
"Keep it." Antonio passed the jacket back, a peace offering.
Sebastian felt a grin tug at the corners of his mouth as he put it on, pausing for a moment to admire the other man's lithe fencer's muscles and bronzed skin. He was the exact opposite of Sebastian, who'd been scrawny and sickly ever since he was a child.
"You know what make you look truly fantastic?" Sebastian murmured.
"What?" Antonio said, dropping to the floor next to him.
Sebastian propped himself up on one elbow so he could reach over to tug on the leg of Antonio's pants.
"And here I thought you were angry at me," the one-time Duke of Milan laughed, grabbing Sebastian's hand and pulling him closer.
Sebastian nuzzled Antonio's neck, smiling through his ragged breaths as he drank in the musky scent of sweat and steel that he had not realized was so dear to him until he had feared he would lose it amidst the roaring waves and howling winds as the deck splintered beneath his feet.
"I believe my exact words were 'fuck you,'" he whispered before he was seized by another coughing fit.
Antonio slowly rubbed his back until the hacking gasps subsided. "Priorities, my lord Sebastian. Let's get out of this cesspit first."
"And how do you plan to do that?"
"Well, we could just wait for Alonso to set us free. You're his sickly little brother. He won't keep you locked up here forever, he knows you wouldn't last a month. Besides, you weren't the one who proposed the plan to murder him."
"But he'll leave you here."
Antonio ruffled Sebastian's hair, sorrow and laughter dancing in eyes that were so dark they were almost black. "I'm a menace."
"Yes, but you're my menace," Sebastian murmured. "So what are we going to do?"
"You are going to cough like you're dying, I'm going to call for a guard, we're going to bash him on the head and break out of here, then we're going to hop aboard the first ship headed out of Naples."
Sebastian sighed. "And go where?"
"I don't know. Marseille. Angers. London. Maybe back to Milan eventually. I still have friends there. I think."
"That's a horrible plan, Antonio."
"Is not. Watch—you start coughing now, and we'll be out of here within the hour."
It was Antonio's reckless smile that made Sebastian roll his eyes and start coughing and hacking up what felt like both his lungs, plus whatever bits were attached to them.
"Guard!" Antonio shrieked. "Guard!"
The guard appeared right on cue, saw the king's brother convulsing on the floor of his cell, and promptly unlocked the door. Two quick punches from Antonio knocked him flat on his back.
"Ready to go?"
Sebastian's coughing shuddered to a stop as he took Antonio's hand and pulled himself to his feet. He tossed Antonio's jacket back to him and started fiddling with the guard's swordbelt, his fingers trembling as he strained to hear the sound of pounding boots racing down the corridor.
"No time for that." Antonio reached down and grabbed the saber, leaving the small dagger for Sebastian. "Come on."
Antonio grabbed Sebastian's hand, and Sebastian let himself be led through the dungeons and straight into the arms of another pair of guards. They charged, swords drawn, and Antonio thrust Sebastian behind him as he stepped forward to meet them.
There was the silver rattle of steel on steel as Antonio engaged the first guard with a smooth flick of his wrist, calm and confident and wearing a reckless smirk plastered across his face as he dueled the other man to the ground with one hand behind his back. He whirled to face the second guard, but before their blades could touch, Sebastian tucked his dagger between his thumb and his palm and sent it hurtling toward his chest.
"I could have taken him."
"A simple 'thank you' would suffice," Sebastian coughed, pulling the knife out and wiping the blade on the guard's uniform.
"Thank you for killing the man I was only going to incapacitate. Now come on."
And then they were off and running again, hurtling up the stairs two at a time and snuffing out every torch they came across, plunging the dungeon into darkness behind them.
"Prisoners on the loose! Prisoners on the loose!" The cry sounded from out of the blackness amidst the clatter of armor and the thud of falling bodies just as the duo reached the ground floor of the palace.
"Why do I let you talk me into these things?" Sebastian moaned as the slap of more guards' boots closed in from either end of the corridor.
"This way!" Antonio hissed, grabbing Sebastian's hand again and dragging him off down a dimly-lit side hall that ended in a series of winding spiral staircases.
"Why are we going up? We'll be trapped on the roof!"
Antonio ignored him and kept running. Sebastian cast a frantic glance over his shoulder and saw that the guards were close enough that the torches were bending their shadows around the stairs, swords straining toward them.
"Antonio…"
"Shut up, Sebastian."
"Antonio, you know the hallway this leads to is a dead end."
"Fuck."
The stairs finally ended, spilling them out into a narrow corridor lined with windows on one side and crumbling tapestries on the other. The far end was ominously dark and showed no sign of having a door.
"Are you sure?" Antonio growled, fingers tightening around the hilt of his stolen saber.
"I grew up in this castle," Sebastian wheezed. "There are approximately—twenty guards—between us and the only way down—from here."
"Or not." Before Sebastian could utter a protest, Antonio slammed his shoulder into one of the windows and dragged them through the shattering glass.
"Antonio, you little shit!" Sebastian screamed as they plummeted toward the waves, clinging tightly to each other's arms.
Antonio grinned his perfect smile, and then the waters of the Gulf of Naples closed over their heads. Sebastian wrenched his wrists free from Antonio's hands and kicked his way back to the surface, teeth chattering violently and hair plastered down over his eyes.
"Shoot them!" roared a voice from the castle that sounded suspiciously like Prince Ferdinand.
Sebastian gulped in a lungful of air and ducked back under the water as the thrum of crossbow strings echoed against the castle's walls. As the guards reloaded, he struck off in the direction of the harbor. That was when he noticed Antonio floundering a few feet away, barely managing to keep his head above the rolling waves.
"You jumped out—a fourth story window—into the Gulf of Naples—when you can't even swim," Sebastian coughed as he paddled over to the other man, dodging another round of bolts. "Hold your breath," he ordered as he folded Antonio's arms securely around his chest and dove deeper into the murky water.
"But you swim so well," Antonio gasped when they surfaced.
"I have also spent the past week—coughing up a lung—in a dungeon. I am not exactly—in top form." Sebastian rolled his eyes and dropped out of sight of the guards again, knifing though the winter-chilled water toward the great hulk of a ship that was slowly navigating its way out of the harbor. The crossbows had stopped firing by the time they reached the boat, but Sebastian wasn't about to look back to see what Ferdinand was doing now.
"Hey!" Sebastian bellowed, treading water next to the three-masted galleon and holding up Antonio with one arm. "Can we get a rope down here?"
To his everlasting surprise, a sailor's head popped over the gunwales, followed shortly by a rope ladder.
"After you, my lord." Sebastian swept a mocking bow, his nose touching the water, and motioned for Antonio to start climbing the ladder before he followed close behind. When they collapsed on deck a few moments later, clothes dripping in a puddle of seawater, they were immediately surrounded by a motely group of sailors. Some bore the insignia of Naples sewn hastily onto their jackets, a few boasted the Spanish flag, and several more sported the French fleur-de-lis. All were in need of a long bath and a good shave.
"Who're you?" grunted one of the men with Neapolitan arms.
"I'm Mercutio, he's Cassio," Antonio said quickly. "We've just had a bit of a scrap with Alonso's guards. Apparently we look like the pair of troublemakers who plotted against the king's life."
The men exchanged knowing looks and began to chuckle to themselves as the sails billowed and snapped in the strong eastern wind. In a few short moments, Naples was nothing but a thick line on the horizon.
"Welcome aboard La Tempesta," said the man with the ragged grey ponytail and bejeweled saber who Sebastian assumed was the captain.
A flash of recognition shot through Antonio's eyes, causing Sebastian's stomach to plummet to his boots. Why couldn't Antonio's plans work, just once?
"Would you like to join the crew, m'lords?" the captain asked, a dangerous glint in his eyes. "Or is it back into the sea with you?"
Antonio staggered to his feet, his hand immediately going to his hip for the hilt of a saber that was somewhere at the bottom of the sea. His mouth moved without sound for a few moments before he finally managed to speak again.
"That's not much of a choice now, is it, Captain Araey?" He spat at the man's feet. "Give me a quill. I'll sign your damned articles."
"I will too," Sebastian piped up, watching uneasily as the crew started peeling off their embroidered jackets and ripping off their insignias before one man ran below decks and started to distribute a pile of plain linen shirts and leather jerkins. There was also a disturbingly large number of swords and daggers and axes mixed in with the clothes.
Antonio and Sebastian were led across the rocking deck to the captain's cabin, where they were presented with a gull-feather quill and a book opened to a page of weathered signatures. Antonio stabbed the pen into the inkwell and signed 'Mercutio' with a flourish, then handed it off to Sebastian so he could quietly inscribe 'Cassio' beneath it. They handed over all their garments with the royal crests of Naples and Milan to the quartermaster and were each issued a worn leather vest and an old sword before being turned loose on the deck again.
"Did—did we just become pirates?" Sebastian asked, running a hand through his ragged brown hair and watching a gull circling the mainmast overhead.
"Yes," Antonio replied curtly. "I'm sorry, this was a horrible idea, we should have just stayed—"
"Cap'n Araey!" Sebastian called, scuttling into the rigging and leaning into the wind, laughing as the sea foam splashed in his face. He gulped in the clean new air, clearing out the last of the dungeon's dankness from his lungs. "Where are we headed?"
The captain bit back a grin as he glanced up. "To the New World."
"The—the New World?" Antonio spluttered, a look of horror on his face. "But—but—"
"No rotting carcass of a butt for us, Mercutio!" Sebastian laughed, climbing higher into the rigging and watching the seas unfurl before them in row after row of dancing waves.
"Run up the flags, lads!" Araey commanded. "Lower the mizzenmast! I want to be passing Gibraltar before the week is out!"
Up went the black flag, and down came the white sails.
And Sebastian smiled.
Author's Note:
Wow. It has been a ridiculously long time since I've posted anything here, and it will probably be a ridiculously long time before I post anything again. Sorry...
The Tempest and all its characters belong to good old William Shakespeare. Thanks, Shakespeare, for giving us so many wonderful plays full of ships and shipwrecks...