Major spoilers through 5A and 5B.
Disclaimer: I own nothing recognizable.
Based off of recent filming and bts spoilers concerning the Jones family. Light captain swan. Title from the lyrics of King and Lionheart by Of Monsters and Men.
Notes: Okay, so it's been said that daddy Jones' name is not Davy. But in the absence of an alternative, that is what I am going to use. Also, each time I'd just about finish with this, new spoilers would be released, I'd need a bit of time to flail, I'd change some things, rinse and repeat. But the feels are too much, please take this while I go cry. Also on tumblr and ao3.
It's not like the first time.
The birth of Liam had been met with marvelous fanfare. He is, the court is sure to remind everyone, the heir to the throne. Yet it still rubs the King a bit raw. This is still his flesh and blood, after all. The Queen often finds him pouting in his study, kingly robes abandoned for simple leather and cotton as he huffs about.
"Oh Davy," she consoles. "We'll love him or her just the same. Isn't that what matters?"
He agrees, but this pattern continues nonetheless, Davy alternately skittering about with joy and sulking in the shadows – until the child stirs impatiently and Davy and Liam are ushered down the hall to wait.
This is where he decides, it's exactly like the first time.
"Why did we have to go, Papa?" Liam asks, voice small and tired.
Why bloody indeed? Davy thinks. "Hush, lad. Come sleep before you topple."
Liam leans into his chest, and is asleep in moments. So, jaw twitching under his beard, Davy waits silently.
In the wee light of the morning, their Liam leans over Davy's shoulders, staring wide-eyed and open-mouthed down at his baby brother.
"He's so…" he whispers, reaching tentatively to graze his little cheeks. "…red."
His wife – oh his beautiful wife – laughs weakly, sweat still bright and slick against her forehead. "He's new, darling," she says. "Give him some time."
Liam looks skeptical, but then he shuffles forward, grasping the baby's tiny hand in his own. His brow furrows, and he leans forward. The two brothers gaze into one another's eyes for several long moments.
Then Liam grins. "What's his name, Mama?"
"Yes, what's his name, Mama?" Davy echoes.
She reaches out and Davy places the child back into her arms. She situates him by her breast before she answers softly, "Killian."
The elder two Jones men nod in approval, matching expressions on their faces.
Davy crowds further around his wife, pulling Liam into his lap. They simply cannot stop gazing into the clear, newborn blue of his eyes, watching as he wriggles about in his mother's arms.
As day stretches towards night, and both mother and children drift off into what Davy hopes are pleasant dreams, he wonders if the color of Killian's eyes – the bright azure he's already quite taken with – will remain.
It does. But she doesn't.
Davy and his boys stand together on a rocky shore, watching the pyre drift in the gentle waves as unbearably sorrowful music rises and falls with the sea. Thousands are gathered behind them, he knows, but in this moment, he's never felt more alone.
"Papa?" Killian says, quiet, frightened. His little, dimpled hands are pulling at the intricately patterned leather of Davy's jacket. He picks the boy up and cradles him to his chest. Liam, though tear tracks are on his cheeks, stands rather stoically at his side.
It's apt, he thinks. Even in grief, Liam is quiet, pressing ever onward. Killian will press on as well, he imagines, but with a great deal of fuss and flourish.
"Papa?" Killian repeats, voice muffled in the fabric of his shirt. "Where'd Mama go?"
Davy opens his mouth to reply, but it catches in his throat.
"Home," Liam says, reaching out to grasp Killian's hand. "To the sea."
Davy wonders when his sons became stronger than him.
The kingdom is in absolute chaos, the stones of his great castle crumbling around him. In his torrential grief, the people have slipped through his fingers and landed in the hands of another. He blames himself, of course, but in a moment of clarity, he realizes anything he may or may not feel is all for naught unless he can save his sons.
So he makes a deal. The man in the robe – darkness in his shadowed eyes and magic at his fingertips – has guaranteed his family's safety. And as the earth quite literally trembles beneath his feet, he knows he must choose between the uncertainty of magic, or the certainty of death.
The man before him is a suspicious character, Davy has to admit, but there is power about him, and in the curve of the ornate silver blade he's glimpsed secured tightly at the man's side. It positively hums, reaching out to him in an eerie and atonal chorus of voices. Davy nearly reaches back, but the man before him interrupts.
"Enchanting, isn't it?"
Davy frowns, averting his eyes. "Do we have a deal or not?"
"All magic comes with a price," the man says. "And I'm afraid yours will be quite severe. Destiny will be bent. Memories must be altered. Pull out the cornerstone, and another must take its place."
"What the bloody hell are you on about?"
"Your sons or yourself, King David. Choose."
Davy doesn't even hesitate. "Them."
He takes a breath, and then he is enveloped in frigid darkness.
For hundreds of years he's been on an absolute hell of a ship, roaming about the Locker, shackled to his grim purpose. He's had plenty of time to square himself with his decisions, to steel his mind against any onslaught of nostalgia, any flood of shame for allowing his selfishness in grief to overtake his responsibility to his people, to his family.
But nothing could have prepared him for this.
His son, his Killian, stands before him, an oddly familiar weapon in his hand – his only hand, he realizes – and a beautiful woman at his side. He can see himself in the man's brow, his hair, his build. But his eyes, the curve of his cheeks, the jut of his chin – those belong to his mother, and three hundred and some years of torment crash down on Davy's chest.
"My son," he says. His whole body is trembling.
Killian's face contorts, but he says nothing in reply. He entwines his fingers with those of the woman beside him, and flees.
Davy's still in shock when a man grasps his shoulder.
"I'm David," the man says. He seems benevolent, yet mildly threatening in his stance and manner. He gestures at a woman behind him. "That's my wife, Snow. We'd like to have a word with you."
Davy sits on a stool in a place called Granny's, with something called hot chocolate steaming under his nose. He's been thoroughly lashed by this realm's royalty for his unfeeling abandonment. And then thoroughly apologized to when a beautiful and brash woman by the name of Regina explains that the reuniting of the blades had likely ended whatever curse he'd been subject to for his willing sacrifice.
Sacrifice. He scoffs. Any sacrifices he'd had to make were, circularly, of his own making, and his family had paid the price, it seemed. In light of being above the Locker at last, he gives himself permission to indulge in self-loathing.
He's at it for a mere ten minutes or so before Killian's companion breezes through the door. She zeroes in on Davy, and perches on the stool next to him. She regards him for several moments, and he has never felt more exposed in his long life. He's come across krakens with less penetrating gazes.
"You did what you thought you had to," Emma says at last. "To give them their best chance. And it backfired. Own up to it, and the fact that Killian doesn't have to talk to you, doesn't even have to look at you. Then maybe you'll get somewhere."
Davy simply nods as he marvels at the woman before him. She is beauty and grace and power, and her candor reminds him so much of Killian's mother that he has to look away for a moment.
"You'd make a hell of a captain, my dear," Davy says, staring down into his mug. "I'd have recruited you in a moment, in the Locker."
Emma laughs, and he looks up, catching the tail end of a secretive smile. "Drink up, Jones, before I do."
She's out as quickly as she was in, and Davy considers it, considers her, as he mutters a gruff, "To hell with it." and sips rather bravely, if he says so himself, at the hot chocolate.
Emma's right, of course.
And damn, that's delicious.
Davy regards the shore ahead of him, the town behind. There's peace here, at the harbor. Quiet affection in the clanking of the mooring, in the patter of feet and conversation as the residents go about their business.
It reminds him of his dear Camelot, when his boys were wee lads yet, and would beg to accompany him at sea. As he watches the water in the afternoon sun, he remembers, he wallows.
"This bloody sword is a menace."
Killian, to his surprise – to his infinite relief – appears at his side, standing but a horse's stride away, fiddling with Excalibur's belt and scabbard.
"I imagine your lovely partner encouraged you to come here," Davy says, unable to contain his smile.
Killian gives the sword a final shove before he says, "She's an inspiration, certainly, but I came of my own accord."
Davy can't bring himself to reply as his smile quickly fades. As much as he wishes fate had not brought them to such a melancholy reunion, he takes a moment to admit to himself that it did, and that he simply does not know the man before him.
So instead he waits. Watches as a myriad of emotions play themselves across his son's dark features.
"Liam…" Killian begins, voice catching on the name. He clears his throat and continues. "Liam is gone."
With all of his years in the Locker, death comes as no surprise to him. He'd assumed his sons had perished long ago. Still, raging silently at the sheer unfairness of his elder son's untimely death, he barely manages, "I know."
"You should have been there. This bloody sword, it should have been yours."
Davy sighs. "The wizard, the man with the dagger, he gave that impression. But Killian…" he trails off. "Killian, please, look at me."
His son looks down at his feet, grinding his teeth. He battles with himself until, at last, he looks Davy in the eye. "He gave that impression," Davy repeats. "But it's your name on that blade, my son. Stars grow, and they dim, but they cannot be moved. You are a hero. It was always you. Even with family stripped and memories altered, it was always you."
Killian looks away, eyes brimming with unshed tears. He takes a deep, shuddering breath, and then he gingerly takes a seat, now less than an arm's length away.
"I know why you weren't," Killian says. "Here, that is."
Davy nods. "For whatever it may be worth…I'm sorry, Killian."
Killian makes no reply. He doesn't nod in return, he doesn't shake his head, he doesn't storm away. He sits by him, and they watch the sea swell in silence.
Until, "I can't believe I'm a bloody king."
Davy laughs, loudly, and he startles even himself when he claps Killian on the back. "Welcome to royalty."
He's fading. Davy has felt it since the moment he appeared in this realm. But he'd opted to ignore it, in favor of learning his son's every move between the boy he'd last seen slumbering in his bed and the well-aged man he finds attached to a simply marvelous woman and her family.
The death of a king can be quite an affair. But Davy supposes he's not a king anymore, so he expects no fuss. Killian is at his side, Emma close beside him, fingers clutched tight around his hook.
"Five days," Killian says quietly. "That's all?"
"Five more than none," Davy replies. "I'm sorry, all the same."
Killian shakes his head. "I can't…"
"Oh Killian." Davy reaches out, takes his hand. "You are your mother's son. You're capable of all this and more." He pauses to take a haggard breath. "You are, after all, a king."
Killian smiles, and they simply look at one another for a long, and overdue moment.
"And you," he turns to Emma, and smiles. "Don't break his heart, lass."
Emma smiles back, tears in her eyes.
They say nothing more, hands and hook pressed together until Davy takes his last breath. His world becomes darkness once more. Now, though – now it's peace.
Killian recalls his mother now. As the grip of centuries old magic fades, he can remember her smile, her laughter, her unwavering resolve.
He can also remember her pyre, and the somber horns that had bid her farewell. He recreates it best he can, and holds Emma close as it floats away.
There is no music. There are no thousands. This is not the Camelot to which he was born. But his family is at his side – Dave and Snow, Regina and Robin and Roland, Henry with his hand clutching at Killian's shoulder. Much lay ahead, but much more lay behind.
When his father's resting place is but a speck on the horizon, and only he and Emma remain on the shore, Emma beckons him home, both sorrow and hope in her eyes as she intones, "Come on. Let's sail away."
He nods, and takes her hand, his hook rapping at the sword at his side. He gives the horizon one last glance, one last watery smile, before he follows her. "Let's."