A/N: This chapter starts talky and ends up somewhat actiony. Next chapter is all action, action, action. Complete with fights and fire and bodice-ripping and murder. Yes - all of the above.

Just before they reached Port Royal, Elizabeth took Jack aside. "I know how much you want your ridiculous party," she told him, "But Will and I are going to have enough trouble getting ourselves accepted again without causing that kind of trouble on our very first day back." Jack gestured for her to just spit it out. "A month," she said quickly. "Drop us in Port Royal alone, and don't return there for a month. That way people won't think straight away to blame it on us when you come staggering. Just give us a month. We can make it worth your while."

Jack didn't even ask what kind of bargain she'd thought up – he had a better one in mind. "All right: persuade me."

"I beg your pardon!" Elizabeth shoved him back and crossed her arms. "I am a married woman, Jack."

"Which is not in the least bit my fault," he reminded her. "In fact I'm rather upset about it. However... I might be able to forgive you for getting married behind me back... if you were to..."

A loud sigh interrupted them, and they both turned to see Will standing well within hearing distance of the whole conversation. "I somehow knew we weren't going to be able to avoid this." He made no move to come stand between them, which was surprising enough, but then he shrugged and said easily, "Go on, darling - you can persuade him if you want."

Elizabeth did a double-take. "What?"

Will sauntered over and kissed her hand, then placed it on Jack's shoulder. "I said go ahead and kiss him if you like." He looked nothing more than curious - not pained or jealous or even tense.

"Don't have to ask me twice," Jack put in, and got to it.

It was certainly Jack's usual kiss - fun and tasty and just this side of rough - but Elizabeth found it much less electric now that she wasn't so conflicted about it. When they broke apart, her heart wasn't racing half so fast as usual.

Jack shook his head with a smile. "You are good," he admitted. Elizabeth knew he wasn't talking to her. "Fine – I'm so nice it amazes me – you two can have your bloody month alone."

"Two weeks will be fine," Elizabeth said. "I only said a month so I'd have something to bargain with."

"Pirate," Jack breathed into her face. He kissed her on the nose and scampered off.

Later on, out of the blue, Willie went up to his father and said, "Jack always teases her but I've never seen him do that. I would have stopped him. Somehow."

Will knew right away what "that" was, and winced. How on earth could he explain it?

"I appreciate your standing up for me," he answered at last. "But you don't have to be angry at either of them – I gave my permission. I know it seems strange, but I love your mother so much that I let her do very stupid things like kiss a pirate every once in a while."

Willie chewed it over and, because he wasn't sure what he thought, decided to answer with something silly. "What about me, Papa? Do you love me enough to let me kiss a pirate?"

It suprised Will into a snort of laughter. "I love you to pieces, son, but I'd no sooner let you kiss a pirate than become one yourself."

The silly mood evaporated instantly and Willie went very still. "You wouldn't let me be a pirate?"

"Lord, no!" Will laughed, before a terrible understanding dawned. "You mean you would want to be?"

Willie had no trouble reading his father's reaction, and invented something quickly. "Course not!" he declared. "I was just being a thrice-damned contrary little whelp like usual. I wasn't being serious."

Later on it occurred to Willie that in his place, his father would never have lied about something so meaningful... but he knew exactly who would.

The Turners were dropped quickly and quietly off at Port Royal and snuck back into their house in the dead of night. They had cooked up a very elaborate story regarding Will's long absence: his accident had not quite killed him, but sent him to a faraway hospital – specifically, in Singapore – where they had amazing mystical medicine-men that could help. It had all been kept a secret because the prospects were uncertain and they didn't want their son's hopes raised for nothing. Then, on the way back, Will had been shipwrecked and left destitute on an island where nobody spoke English, and he had only just finally managed to make it home.

They were very proud of this story and had practiced making it sound natural, but unfortunately nobody seemed to care much at all. As it turned out, Will's lack of political ambitions or wealth or extramarital scandals meant that people were largely uninterested in his return to the city. Even the Governor, when he got back from returning the cannibals to their island, was not sufficiently shocked to require smelling salts.

"I've seen so many bizarre things lately," he said with more irritation than anything else. "What's one more added to the pile?" He agreed with Elizabeth that they should have a big reception to honor Will's return, and accepted the date she suggested without any suspicion whatsoever.

Over the wheezing objections issuing forth from Mr. Mercer's hospital bed, Governor Swann officially cleared Norrington of the charge of fraternizing with pirates. He ordered Jack Sparrow's body tarred and caged and hung up near the harbour.

He thought he had pretty much tied up all the loose ends.

The Turners thought it was going to be pretty funny when it all unraveled.

So the day eventually came for Will's welcome-home party. It was a huge affair hosted by the Governor and attended by anybody who was anybody, and Elizabeth spent the afternoon receiving guests in a gigantic gown and looking over her shoulder for Jack Sparrow to make his entrance.

Finally, it was almost dinnertime and the guests were all accounted for, so the massive front entrance was closed. Not five minutes later, there was a knock.

Elizabeth had been lurking by the door all day so that she would be the one to handle it. She stood by as men swung the door open and prepared a speech to calm everyone down...

But when the door opened, she was speechless – because it wasn't Jack Sparrow at all. "I know it's terribly rude of me to turn up uninvited..."

Elizabeth finally found her voice. "Lord Beckett?!"

He shook his head reproachfully, still smiling. "How many times must we-"

"Cutler. You're alive. What are you doing here? Come in, come in." She took one of his hands in both of hers and held it to her chest. "You wouldn't believe how glad I am to see you - and I don't even like you!" Her smile faded and she looked him over. "Are you all right?"

He ordered his heart to exit his stomach and return to its proper place and for Heaven's sake stop pounding. Elizabeth glad to see him - and it was obviously genuine - was so unnerving that he wasn't sure he could manage a tone of proper sarcasm, so he just nodded.

"Well, I'm glad if my advice helped you. How did you escape him?" Her eyes were glowing. She was excited, admiring, exactly as he'd always wanted her...

It almost killed him to admit, "I...didn't."

She frowned, and then understood. She dropped his hand and stepped back. "I see. So you are here under Davy's orders tonight?"

"I work for Jones now, yes. However, I assure you my aims here tonight are entirely self-serving." Years of practice let him project contemptuous amusement no matter how he was feeling. "He's going to allow me to live on land. Everyone's here tonight, so I thought – if the hostess doesn't object – this might be a good opportunity to start working myself back into the fabric of Port Royal life."

"Oh, don't flatter yourself, Cutler," she laughed derisively. "You were never a part of the fabric of Port Royal life. At the very best you're a barnacle clinging to our hull. Come." She took his arm and made him escort her back into the party. "How shall I introduce you?"

"Elizabeth..." He tried to get her to look at him.

"Let me do my duty as hostess first. I won't consider gutting you til afterwards."

After they made their rounds of the room – Lord Beckett laughing off rumors of his death and gracefully fielding compliments about how he'd hardly aged a day – Elizabeth dragged him into a broom closet and pushed him down onto a box. "Now talk: what are you doing here?"

Beckett put his hands on her hips and guided her down so that she was kneeling by his seat. It was hard to make out eye contact in the dim light, so he took her by the chin to make sure she was looking at him. "I'm allied with Davy Jones against anyone who crosses him – which, at the moment, means your pirates." He dropped nearly a whisper and added, "We are enemies now, Elizabeth." It was as though he'd forgotten that they had always been enemies, and she pulled away with a snort. "Don't underestimate me," Beckett warned. In the dark she could hear him stand up. "Perhaps you can beat me in a swordfight, but I assure you if we're going to play politics I will maneuver you right into a corner... and hold you there."

His breath was suddenly on her neck, but she refused to be intimidated. Instead, she slid a stiletto from her bodice and turned to face him. "Fortunately, at close quarters my skills are more useful than yours," she growled. She pressed the tip of her blade into his throat and he laughed against it.

"I'm going to enjoy dealing with you, my dear."

"Rest assured the feeling is not mutual." She glared at him and wished it were light enough for him to see it. "Does Davy know about tonight?"

"Does Jack?"

"Cutler, I mean it! These are innocent people. I have to know that they're safe, or I'm going to send them home!"

"Relax," Beckett purred, once again standing far too close for comfort. "Jones is concerned with the Pearl, not with you. I can't imagine what he'd gain by making an appearance at your little party. Can you?"

There was amusement in his voice beyond just the joy of harassing a pretty woman. She suddenly worried that somehow he knew that the Pearl was around. "You're not telling me something," she accused. "Out with it. Come, we both know you're going to tell me, because if you don't tell me then you won't get to gloat. So: out with it."

"You're such a storm cloud," he complained, "Spoiling my sunny afternoon in the park. Very well, I admit it: I have something of a surprise for you. It's a surprise which regrettably cannot travel just now, but I think it would be well worth your while to take a ride with me and see it."

"Take a ride with you?" she laughed. "Are you mad?"

"We'll be back before we're missed. I promise you're not at risk of bodily harm – and you know perfectly well lying and murder are not my style."

"Yes, you're more for manipulation and execution."

"Precisely." He smiled, sensing that she was giving in. "Besides, you've already pointed out that I can't overpower you... what are you afraid of?"

What she was afraid of was that her party would be overrun by pirates while she was away... but she couldn't very well tell Cutler that, could she? It wouldn't do to let him know anything about Jack's plans. And so, being out of excuses, she agreed to sneak out of the party to go see what horrid surprise her enemy had dredged up… so long as they let Will know he was taking her.

Just before they left the broom closet Beckett suggested that her dress was too cumbersome to sneak around in. "You should change into something slightly less... constricting. Shall I?" He raised a hand to her laces.

She slapped him across the face. "Next time it'll be a dagger, savvy?" she snapped. "Hands to yourself."

She was so annoyed with Beckett that she was hardly paying attention as they snuck out the kitchen entrance of the mansion and slipped off into the gathering darkness. She didn't notice any of the shady characters lurking around the house... even the one who abandoned his post in the shadows to follow her.

Elizabeth was right to expect the pirates in the near future – they were in fact already in Port Royal, and had been strutting around the city drunk for most of the day. The captains had had them park the Pearl far away from the harbor the night before and slip into town on foot, in as much disguise as they could muster. In the course of their sightseeing, they'd stumbled upon the gibbeted body of the infamous pirate Jack Sparrow… and considering they still had some time to kill before making their entrance into Elizabeth's party, Jack decided to take a moment there.

"'Ello, handsome!" he called up.

Handsome didn't answer back.

Jack continued to stare, stroking his beard thoughtfully as he looked at his corpse's. "D'you think the beads are a little bit much, then?"

But that gave him an idea. Beads... ornaments... jewelry! "My rings! You've got on my rings, don't you?!" Jack threw a rock up at the cage. "'Ey! You up there!"

Barbossa whacked him in the head. "Be quiet and quit lollygaggin."

"You're not going to be any fun at all tonight, are you," Jack complained. "Listen, I want a minute here. You and the men go on up ahead and wait for me. Just lurk around or something until I get there. We won't go in until after dark anyhow - much more fearsome that way. Go on."

Barbossa could think of no conceivable reason for refusing Jack some time alone with his corpse, so he just took the men on up ahead to skulk in secret around the Governor's mansion until it was time to crash the party.

Once he was alone, Jack looked around and decided that the tree from which the gibbet hung might be the answer.

He climbed up the tree, but couldn't get high enough to climb out on the limb that held the body, so instead he clung to the trunk and drew his sword. If he leaned, he could just barely touch the tip to the bars, and he could push and get the cage swinging. He pushed again, and it swung a little further. Push. Swing. Push. Swing. P-

"Sorry, love!" he called when he missed the bars on one poke and actually stabbed his blade into the tarred corpse.

Eventually the cage was in grabbing distance. He timed his jump perfectly so that the cage was swinging towards him, and let go of the tree and leaped aboard. "Ahoy! Gotcha!" he gasped. He was now inches from his own dead bloated face, and he found that it made him a little nervous. Talking helped. "How are things then, eh? You won't be needing these anymore, now, will you? Oh, come on, Jack, where's the trust? Give over!" He got a hand through the bars, but the corpse's arms were crossed on its chest and the hands all stuck together with some grisly force he didn't really want to think about.

Finally he isolated one hand and went for the rings. They were ordinarily very loose, but the corpse had puffed up so much that Jack had to seriously consider cutting off his own (former) fingers. In the end he settled for breaking the fingers one by one and then working his rings patiently over each disjointed knuckle.

He was on the very last one when somebody loud and drunk shouted "Geddown frmm there or I'll shoot!"

Jack froze, heard the sound of a gun cock, and dropped to the ground. "All right, all right, look, I can explain-" he began, but a bullet whizzed by his head.

Fortunately Norrington was too drunk to come anywhere near hitting his target. Once his bullet was spent he backed away so fast he tripped and fell on his ass, then fumbled around trying to reload. He fully intended to shoot himself this time. If he was so far gone he would see Jack Sparrow's face on every pitiful criminal and grave robber from now til eternity, well, then he might as well just end it now as-

But a hand closed over his and pulled it from his gun. "Why don't we give this to me," the voice purred. Sparrow's voice. "There, isn't that better?"

Norrington blinked his eyes into focus and stared, and yes, even from a distance of six inches, it was Sparrow's face. "Leave me be!" he shouted, so sloppy drunk that the words could barely be made out. "Please stop…" He began weeping, as well, which didn't help his intelligibility any. He fell to his knees and covered his face, mumbling, "God forgive me, forgive me I-…I know suicide's a sin but I can't live like this, I can't, I deserve nothing but Hell anyway after I- God, how..." he swallowed and grabbed the ghost's shoulders and said feverishly, "I see him - you - everywhere! Leave me alone! If only I could have a... I mean I'd never, I wouldn't, good God that was a friend, I stood by and-... Where's my gun? My gun – give me my gun."

"Mmm, how about not," Jack suggested. "Listen here: you do get another chance. See – here I am and I'm fine. And better yet, we're going to a party tonight."

Norrington started to laugh. "I'm sure we are. A party in Hell. So it seems I'm going mad, then?"

"Course not," Jack said firmly. "You're fine. See?" He shook him, then slapped him a good one. "There, that feels real, doesn't it?"

Head spinning, Norrington sank down to the ground with his face in his hands. He concentrated on just breathing (and not hurling) for a good long time. When he finally sat up again, it took him a while to remember where he was. He had come out to see Jack (again!), and had had one of those episodes where he thought he could actually see and hear-

Jack only nodded happily.

"I don't understand." He stood, grimacing at the headache it brought him, and grabbed at the apparition. "Is this a dream? How drunk am I? Or have I truly lost my mind this time?"

"No to the first, very to the second, and as to the losing-your-mind bit, well... it's difficult to say." Jack flashed him a smile. "Come on, mate - I died, my friends sailed to World's End to find me... it's not the first time."

Norrington's heart leaped - the way it always did, every night when he saw Jack and Jack forgave him, no matter how many times he told himself it was just a dream. "Jack Sparrow is not alive," he said evenly, and just waited for himself to wake up.

But instead, Jack just smiled and gave a little bow. "Captain Jack Sparrow, actually. Now, if you'll excuse me for just one moment..." He went over to the tree where the gibbet was and began to climb it.

Norrington finally began to believe. "Only you, Sparrow, would rob your own grave," he murmured. "My God... it really is...?"

"Yep," Jack called down when the last ring finally came loose. "It's me. Now hold on one minute and let's see if I can't get into these pockets, eh?"

"Get down here, you idiot!"

"Not without my effects," Jack said grimly, stripping baubles and ornaments from his corpse until he was certain he had retrieved everything that mattered. "All right... now let's get on to that party, eh?"

TBC.

Next chapter is bizarro! Woo hoo. Leave me a review – we're fast approaching the end.