Horizon-Child
Fanfiction: Pirates of the Caribbean: AWE canon
Rating: K
Disclaimer: Don't own them, aren't making any money. All credit to the big-eared mouse.
Jack lifted his eyes reluctantly up to the twisted strands of rope high above him. Odd how clear one's vision was at a time like this. It would be clearer if that dolt of a Navyman hadn't clobbered him in the eye.
The braided rope was not a strange sight for him. He knew all kinds of rope inside out, how to bend them to any will, any shape, make them bear your weight against all gravitational odds. He knew their silken feel, their dead weight when wet, the sticky, stinking tar the oil boys sloshed them down with, the rough tearing at your palms when they slid from your grasp, the spliced, brutal fibers ripping at a man's back. But he had not expected to see this one so soon.
Oh, it was coming for him, that he had known from the beginning. His was a noose neck, that was for sure. But he had thought he would stare straight-backed through it, like the finished hoop of his own life, not squint up at it in the morning light. He had thought he would be taller.
The chains were heavy on his thin ankles, but he barely noticed that now. There had been time enough for that before, time to cry and remember soft things like mothers and un-swaying floors, time to wonder what his life might have been like if he had never gone to sea.
Now he was empty, staring at the rough boards below his feet, the smell of death like perfume in the air. So many hung together...
He didn't know most of the men and women standing beside him, lost in their own last, never-to-be-heard thoughts. They were dirty and wretched, lonely and poor, united in that only. Some, Jack knew, were born to hang. Others had loved the wrong men or drank with the wrong boys. Death was so close he could feel it like a hand on his back, pushing him forward.
He turned the flat silver of a piece of eight in his hand, slowly, his eyes on the mesmerizing trace of its' stamp. He knew what this meant, this insignificant coin. And he knew it would be lost when it tumbled from his lifeless hand. The gloom was so dark about him, he could barely see, though the morning sun was high. The heavy carts of dead already buzzed with flies and the only sound was the light clank of manacles in their housing.
He might be lost, he realized, but they would never be. Never shall we die, the song came back to him, a sense of magic beyond anything he had ever seen. He might hang, but his father never would. The thought gave him new hope, though he entertained no fantasies of life. No, there was only one act left to him on this earth: he would sing.
His voice was faint when he began, parched in the sun, trembling for the life it was about to lose. The king and his men stole the queen from her bed, he began, the words young, sweet, soft, not at all the way his father had sung it, but clearly an invocation, the beginning of something powerful. He studied the ground through the gaps in the boards, afraid that if he lifted his head, the words would cease, the magic break upon his lips, the coin still spinning restlessly in his dirty fingernails. He did not want to see the endless lines of beaten men and women, waiting to share his fate. He did not want to see the sky so tantalizingly close, nor feel the tempting blankness of the sheer drop to the sea.
...and bound her in her bones. The words flowed easier now, memories of his father, of drinking ale with his grandfather, the song an unbroken creed that bound them, spilling from him. He was of the sea and always would be. That, he shared with all the men and women herded here to die. They all had the ocean in their blood and there was no shame in that. The salt breeze ruffled his hair and he lifted his head slightly. No, he would not die afraid. For wasn't his a noose neck, hadn't his father always said so? No, there was no shame in that.
The seas be ours... He could hear the executioner's heavy tread behind him, passing across the creaking platform. The salt spray gushed in again, bringing memories of standing at the bow, wild, free. He was not a creature of the land nor the sky. He was a horizon-child, born of a storm between twilight and midnight in the grey dimness where sky meets sea and he was as free as the blue-inked birds that flew in tattooed clouds about his calf. He would not fear death, neither as a consequence of his life nor as a punishment. Yes, he was a pirate, and yes, he was a horizon-child, and no, he was not ashamed of either.
...and by the powers...The executioner was coming back, his steps the slow, sure ones of dread. Jack bit his lip, a last rush of pleasant memories paining him, reminding him that he didn't want to die. Across that far, narrow stone wall, the sea gushed against its' bed, calling him with visions of freedom, so close and yet so very far away. He prayed he would have time to finish the invocation, that he would not die in vain. Summoning his strength and the last defiant words, he lifted his head and sang, louder, clearer, filled with the purpose of his deed, moving beyond all fear.
…Where we will, we'll roam! Hope was on his face, his eyes on that far distant sky, that far distant sea where his lady, the beautiful ship, Pearl flew somewhere, unfettered, unfound.
The executioner slammed a barrel down in front of him and lifted Jack onto it easily, efficiently, the shackles clanking, his motions beyond reproach, beyond emotion. That was why he wore a mask. No one knew what the executioner thought as he set the small boy on the barrel to die. No one cared. The rope tightened about his neck, the executioner's heavy gloves scraping against his pale, dirty throat.
Jack knew his own weight would not be sufficient to break his neck, not even with the added height. He would swing, strangling slowly. For reasons he could not figure, this did not frighten him. He wondered, once, vaguely, whether his father would have met this fate with the same finesse and surmised he would. He might even be proud of him. But his father was not a man you could catch. A shame the same couldn't be said of his son.
Beside him, Monté stirred, rising out of whatever daze he was in. "Yo Ho," he whispered in a terror-stricken voice, "all hands…" It was automatic, a reflexive clinging to the memories of life.
Jack remembered his strong voice ringing out over the ship to the many sailing songs they had roared out on endless voyages beneath the stars, and wished to hear it again, the way it had been, clear, almost lovely.
"Hoist the colours high!" His voice waxed, sorrow trembling on his dark face.
Jack joined him, his voice shaking, but true, and to his surprise, the others on the gallows began to sing, Martha's light voice rising audibly above the others. "Heave ho, thieves and beggars…"
Jack saw the Navymen shift uneasily, no longer sure of themselves, for the prisoners in the lines had begun to sing, in voices cracked and clear, ragged and soft, defiance on their features. The magic was out of Jack's control now: they were singing their own dirge.
"…never shall we die!"
They began again, the Navymen falling back, guns trained. The irony; frightened by a song, but Jack found no room for a smile on his face or in his heart.
"Yo Ho, haul together..."
That they all knew it was astounding, but Jack let no thought stray to that, considered none of the tremor in the air, the sheer power of the words he spoke.
"Hoist the colours high!"
His eyes were on the sheen of the piece of eight, his ears trained to its' faint wail.
"Heave ho..."
His hands shook, for even the adrenaline of the song could not deceive his mind. He knew where he was.
"...thieves and beggars..."
Chains rattled as the prisoners shook their clenched fists in time, something wild transfiguring their features. Hope? Hatred? Defense? Abandon? Jack didn't know but he could hear the monotonous tread of the executioner's stride and he knew his life was over.
He fixed his eyes on the sky and filled his lungs with air, loss and sorrow rushing through him, the salt breeze stirring his hair like the gentle touch of Calypso. He was going to die and there were no shackles, no rope that could keep him from his sea, his ship, his sky.
"…never shall we die!"
The barrel dropped from beneath him. But the rope that broke little Jack Sparrow's neck and broke his song could not break his spirit. The horizon-child was free.