Title: Priorities 2/2
Author: Eurothrashed
Feedback: Yes, please.
Disclaimer: My muse, who is an independent if minor deity, possessed them like whoa.
Rating: Pg13
Summary: Happy endings aren't justfor idealistic, young Governor's daughters...
A/N Storyteller!Jack makes me warm and fuzzy.
Pirate ships, pirate ships, child
Merry and bold, Sparkling and rich, child
Coming to dock, Right at your feet
Tonight, Coming to dock tonight
Dally not with sirens, lest they drag you under. Practical, adaptable wisdom; right up there with Greeks bearing gifts, knowledge being synonymous with power, and compassion curing more sins than condemnation. A siren tempted you with a fair face and a maddening song; it seemed that Captain Jack Sparrow did it with ample amounts of rum and frighteningly lucid speeches of the sea and freedom.
Jack Sparrow had to have something unnatural about him, some kind of magickal lure, his own siren song as it were. Because, here was Elizabeth Swann, head quite contently on Jack's shoulder, trying not to drift to sleep as he spun her a tale or two. It actually surprised Elizabeth to learn that, despite his fervor in condemning true love and happy endings earlier that day, Jack seemed fond of relating happily ever afters. Although, she had also learned that he wasn't above tossing in the random dashing pirate Captain, to give the hero a (reluctant) hand and (valiantly try) to woo the heroine. Those parts never failed to earn Jack a soft laugh from his drowsy audience, the characters reminding Elizabeth so much of Jack, Will, and herself not to be amused.
She idly traced the branching scar on the inside of his arm, her fingertips following the coarse, forking lines. For every intersection, she counted off a half-remembered sea shanty she had sung as a child, and for every raised line, she counted off a thrilling story she had overheard when her father thought she was asleep. Jack's storytelling was a soothing rasp; his words often beguiling in nature - sometimes flat and purposely (irritatingly) ignorant, other times laced with a teasing mockery as he quoted lines from Shakespeare and arbitrary bits of poetry.
Captain Jack Sparrow was everything that she had ever read him to be, and then nothing like she had expected. Yes, he was made up bawdy songs and stories of high sea adventure; but he was also a touch more touched than the tales would have you believe.
Mad, she thought with something akin to genuine fondness, more than just a bit mad. But there was method to his madness, a type of crazy genius that made men leave port and join his crew even though they didn't now where they were going or what sorts of (mis)adventures they would partake in. When you joined Captain Jack Sparrow's crew, you didn't join for the hope of riches or veiled promises of being free men. Oh no, you joined because Captain Jack Sparrow would be at the helm, plotting your course, and that in itself was an honour. You could see it in their faces when someone would mention his name, or in the blind faith they showed when he would hatch one on his seemingly insane, suicide plans. Elizabeth herself, couldn't help but be swept up in the way Jack was able to get out of scrape after scrape; which is what had led to her yelling at him, demanding to know what he planned on doing to get them off of this bloody island.
Jack had fallen from grace in those few moments it took for him to tell her the truth behind the fantastic narrative.
Three days on a beach, drinking rum.
In those few moments, Jack's mythic status had been ripped away, and he had stood there, nothing but a fallible, human man telling her that he really didn't know how they were going to get out of this one.
Elizabeth won't lie, the Captain Jack Sparrow of her childhood's death had stung, and even now she could feel the ache. She had read every one of his stories; early on, hiding the papers and letters she had taken from her father under a loose floorboard near her balcony window. He was the only pirate she would admit to day dreaming about, wishing she could join his crew and share in his exploits. She still read his stories, always keen on the next one, simply because he was the best, and his stories were always the best - always the most exciting, always the most daring, and always, always the most fun.
Jack enjoyed being a pirate Captain; Elizabeth couldn't really say she enjoyed being a Governor's daughter.
"Eliz-a-beth, dar-ling," Jack singsonged, "You're not listening."
Elizabeth flatted her palm again his arm, covering the stories she knew were hidden there. "Yes, I am."
"Oh, really?" That mocking lilt to his voice was back in full force; but now, all it did was make her lips quirk at the corners.
"Yes," she said.
Jack let out a derisive snort and a short laugh. "Then you're perfectly alright with the pirate Captain trading the hero for a ship an' runnin' off with the lad's bonny lass, thus ruining the happy ending?"
"Will she be happy?" Elizabeth quietly asked, sleep finally starting to claim her.
She could faintly feel Jack's fingertips smooth over the cloth bandaging her hand, just as faintly as she could feel his warm breath twisting through her hair. "Oh, aye," he said, "Very happy."
Elizabeth smiled a drowsy smile and closed her eyes. "Then it isn't really ruined, is it?
END