Dark Waters

Disclaimer: If I owned Pirates of the Caribbean, it would either be insanely cheerful (like some of my other stories) or horribly sad (like this one)

Poisoned Lips

A/N: PLEASE READ!!! It might not be quite clear in the story, but it is happening during the journey to World's End, on the ship. The beginning is either a flashback or a dream. I didn't want to clearly define the line between reality and dream, so I didn't italicize the dreams and flashbacks.

"I'm not sorry."

The words were poison. They filled her whole being with the bitter poison of a guilty lie. She turned and ran. Because she was afraid, scared of what she had done, what she had become. She ran from his dark, mocking eyes, from his mouth twisted in taunting scorn…

Often she awoke in the night, crying. Always, she woke from the same dream. His lips, hot, insistent, strong on hers. The cold of the chain against her hand, contrasting chillingly with the fevered heat of his mouth. His kiss, so urgent, so brutal. The last kiss. The kiss of death. And always, in her dream, there was poison on her lips, poison that flooded both their bodies.

She would wake in tears, aching to say the words that were too late. "I'm sorry, Jack." She sobbed them, screamed them into the night, muffled by the blankets.

Daylight brought no relief. Guilt was within her, the deadly poison on her lips. It ate her from the inside and the few hours of sleep granted to her were an endless repetition of the same thing. His dark lips, sinful, corrupt. Yet it was her who had killed him in the end. There had been no lust in their kiss, just the downward spiral of death. He had known.

She closed her eyes, trying to hide from the world. Trying to run away from the memories. She wanted to escape the recollection of his black eyes, the shadow of the smirk across his face, his lips…

But her guilt spun her thoughts back to the same thing, endlessly. She found herself reliving every detail, feeling it all again. Meeting his lips softly at first, then with growing fierceness, pushing backwards, feeling his mouth dance on hers, his rough lips crushing hers. She could feel again his back hitting the mast, pulling away, their lips still brushing as the shackle closed with the dull clang of fate slamming a down shut forever. No way out now, her choice was made. But if she could only have said it… "I'm sorry, Jack."

She often crept out onto the deck at night. She stood by the mast of their ship, running her fingers over the rough wood. Was it here that she had killed Jack, or was somewhere else? Were these the shackles that had chained him, or was that on another ship? Was it on this deck that their lips had met in the kiss of sin? Were they waiting for her in the boats? Was that Jack's lips brushing against hers, or a breath of warm air? Was Jack there, or was that a fleeting shadow? Who was she, anyway? Well-bred lady and governor's daughter, or pirate, murderess, and traitor? She surely couldn't be both.

Blind in the darkness of the night, she clung to the words throbbing within her, as if they were an anchor. "I'm sorry, Jack." She clung to them, knowing that if she let go, she would float away, into the blackness, into the unknown, and be lost forever, wandering for eternity over the waters of a sea that had no end and no beginning.

"I'm sorry, Jack."

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