And now: what happened to dear Elizabeth. I'm honestly shocked nobody guessed it...

Elizabeth went on the offensive as soon as they were alone. "You have been a perfect gentleman to me, from the very start when you were a skeleton and I was a prisoner whose name you didn't even know," she declared. "And since then it's only gotten better. We've risked our very lives for each other, Captain... I refuse to believe you'll let anything happen to me now just to frighten your crew."

"Touching." Barbossa turned away from her to adjust his bandage beneath his shirt. As soon as he thought his voice would be steady, he snapped, "Would it have really been so hard for you to step in?"

"To stop Will, you mean?" She shook her head. "I force him to respect my independence, so I'd bloody well better respect his in return, don't you think? He had to decide for himself. I wasn't going to try and stop him."

Barbossa was slowly working his coat up his arms. "You understand the problem. The problem is I'm hearin a lot of -mmn- bets going on about whether or not Captain will -arr- keep to his word, or whether in his -pphh- infirmity -arr- he'll start lettin discipline go lax around here."

Elizabeth pretended not to notice the interruptions in his speech and didn't offer to help. She wasn't feeling particularly sympathetic towards him right now, and he would probably prefer it that way anyway, and besides, there were more important things on her mind. "I understand. So what are you going to do?"

"What I said I would."

"But... but you didn't say." He didn't answer, and she felt the first tickle of doubt. Panic wouldn't be far behind. "You'd scar me for life, you said. A fair bit of permanent damage... those were your words." He nodded. She backed away. "You can't be serious."

"Miss."

"All right, all right, of course you can, but you aren't. Right? Captain – stop looking at me like that. I'm not afraid. You're not really going to... to..." She drew herself up. "All right, you win, I'm beginning to get a bit nervous. Only nervous, though – still not afraid. Now just tell me what's in your head."

Barbossa liked her for the same reason Jack liked the thump-thump. "I'll tell you what's not in my head," he offered coyly. "Silly William thinks I'm goin to beat you to pieces, but I've already told you, you're far too pretty for that. I see Davy's bosun already caught ye a good one." He gestured to the whip wound she'd gotten in the battle. The whole thing was raw and flaming red, with just a little blood oozing up near her collarbone. "One's enough, is it not?"

"One's plenty, Captain. And it made me realize I owe you some serious thanks for the way you handled things last time."

She was making very large doe-eyes at him and he wasn't sure if it was intentional or not. "You're most welcome. Sadly, though, I won't be handlin things that way again."

Elizabeth bit her lip. "How, then?"

"It's probably nearly ready now, so I'll show you. Come." He led her out on deck, explaining, "I almost thought better of this after your...oh… malaise over the passing of dear Lord Beckett. And then I thought, it's hard to guess what Miss Elizabeth is thinkin, so maybe I'll show her and we'll go ahead with it."

The rumor had spread that some punishment was afoot, so a small crowd had gathered on deck to watch the goings-on. Elizabeth was relieved to see that her father was not present.

Norrington was. He looked at her and pantomimed a question: do you need help? Unlike Will, who would have just rushed into all danger in an absurd yet impressive attempt to pull her out, Norrington made sure to check first that he wouldn't be making the danger worse.

She couldn't let Norrington get involved in this, so she had to reassure him somehow. She shook her head and, when she was utterly certain Barbossa wasn't looking, fluffed the feather on his hat and rolled her eyes. Pirates, she mouthed, shaking her head. Norrington at first looked mildly horrified to see her treat the ship's volcano god like a troublesome child, then relaxed when it appeared she had gotten away with it.

Barbossa took her to the stone slab, which the pirates had surrounded with metal things and lit a big fire on top of. A large open flame on a ship? Had the captain taken leave of his senses?

It was as though he had read her mind. "The wind's calm today, it's not so dangerous as it looks. Now look at this: Jack stole it while the two of you were pokin around in Beckett's office."

He reached for an iron that was in the fire and even before he withdrew it she knew what it was.

The pirate brand.

This was not something that she had foreseen. "N-no," she managed at last.

"No? I hadn't realized I was offerin you a choice." He set the brand back down in the fire and Elizabeth was able to speak again.

"No," she repeated. "Captain, please, don't do it. I'm deadly serious. You can't – don't you realize what it means? You'd be putting me in danger, in constant danger of being hanged, for a woman in my position I can't have– it, it would ruin my whole life-"

"Easy, miss," he chuckled. "Of course I would ne'er do it as it was done to us. I was thinkin I would put it back here-" he indicated the back of his shoulder- "where no one would see."

"Us," she repeated. "You're branded, too? I've seen Jack's but I never noticed..." Try as she might she couldn't picture him jailed.

He rolled up his sleeve. It was on the inside of his forearm, and unlike Jack's very neat little scar, it was a fearsome, sloppy mess. After all this time, she no longer needed to ask the question aloud - he could sense it coming and just volunteered the information himself. "I did mine myself, that's why."

"You mean...?"

"I mean I held it in one hand and touched it to the other and lo and behold, my hands weren't steady enough."

"Why?"

"Why wasn't I steady?"

She gave him a reproachful look. "Be serious. If you tell me about yours, I promise I'll at least consider it."

He hid his smile. He had known all along that Elizabeth's curiosity and her hunger for a good story would be his best allies and sure enough...

"All right. Let's take a seat and I'll tell you all about it."

Captain Barbossa proposed a daring raid on a city that was far too well-guarded. He knew perfectly well that he was going to lose a whole heap of men. In fact, that was part of his plan. The crew had gotten a little greedy and reckless lately, and he wanted to make it a little more manageable by replacing some of these seasoned killers with a few new, timid young men who still had all their limbs and eyes.

So he gave his orders. Although he'd always had an amazing talent for motivating large crowds of stupid and hostile people, the crew sensed that they were being led into a death-trap and voiced some complaints. They never shied from a good fight, but this time they were afraid of being captured and jailed and then, a result of the brand that most of them wore someplace on their bodies, summarily hanged. Barbossa himself did not have a brand, and they seemed to feel that he was therefore in less peril on this adventure than they were.

At this point in his career, when every other word out of his mouth was yarrr and he was scarred up so thoroughly his own mother wouldn't recognize him, there was really no point to refuse the pirate P, was there? He had no intention of attempting to pass for an honest sailor at any point in the future. So Barbossa shrugged and said, "If you faithless dogs are really afraid I'll forget which side I'm on, I've no objection to giving us a reminder. We have a brand, don't we? Bring it forward. Light up a fire. Well? Why're you all lookin at each other like schoolboys caught in the cookie jar? I've said I'll take that mark, and I meant it."

Awed, they set things up as he ordered. They offered him some grog to dull the pain, but he only rolled his eyes and fried them with his contempt. (In fact, he admitted to Elizabeth, he would have loved to take the grog, but he thought it unwise to attack himself with a piece of red-hot metal while drunk).

He was very proud of the speech he'd given them that day. A few choice words on the danger they were about to run, and then a reminder that he would be risking himself right there beside them. "Feast your eyes," he'd finished, so carried away with his own rhetoric that he didn't even think to feel afraid, "And see how your captain serves you with his own body. With his own burning flesh!"

He held out one arm, picked up the brand with the other, and pressed it in.

He didn't want to scare Elizabeth off, so he didn't tell her how absolutely debilitating the pain was. He told her that he had stood deadpan and silent - which was true. He did not tell her that it was because he was completely paralyzed, helpless, frozen long enough to shout to himself Let go, idiot, or you'll burn through to the bone!

At last he managed to throw the thing down, and stood staring at his arm for just long enough to ensure that his vision was clear and his eyes dry. Then he looked up and called out, "Satisfied?"

The ones who survived that raid stayed with him for the rest of their lives. He could count on one hand the number of times any of them had argued with him in all the years since.

When he finished the story, he could tell she had already decided. He wanted her to be sure. "Careful, now, miss. It's not something we can undo afterward. You didn't like what I did to your friend Lord Beckett..."

"Lord Beckett was not my friend," she said right away, "And just because one pirate will stab someone in the back doesn't mean that another pirate has to. Jack told me the whole point is doing what you want to do simply because you want to do it. Hang the rules, right? Look what I did to Jack – I killed him and then I sailed to World's End for him. I am a pirate. I have a conscience. To say anything else would be a lie."

"So you'll take the brand?"

"Ah... so I did have a choice." Her laugh was warm and teasing. "It's all right, you did scare me but I forgive you. I think this is a good idea. Now... tell me, is it better or worse than being shot?"

Barbossa contemplated his multitude of bullet and stab wounds and answered, "Depends how bad you're shot. In your case… It'll probably be a little worse." He told himself it wasn't really a lie. After all, a little was subjective, wasn't it?

She nodded. "All right – I can do it."

"Where?"

"Well, I've been walking around here in my underthings but I suppose that will all change when I'm a great lady and all that. The shoulder is fine."

He guided her back towards the fire and helped her out of Norrington's dressing gown. "Will ye be able to hold still, or should I get some rope?"

The crowd was giving them a wide berth, but Elizabeth was still very aware of all the people watching her. If hecould do it himself the least she could do was stay still for it! "I don't need to be tied."

Norrington interrupted the proceedings by shoving through the crowd and interposing himself between the captain and Elizabeth. He took her by the shoulders and told her, his voice low and urgent: "You don't have to do this."

She removed his hands gently. "First of all, yes I do – rules are rules. Second…" she lowered her voice, deciding that it was not something that needed to be shared with the pack of Port Royal citizens she was about to spend the rest of her life with. "…It's what I want. You know I deserve it."

"Elizabeth… pirates are… I mean…"

"A short drop and a sudden stop, right?" She laughed. "I've never forgotten that. James… if you could convince Will to break a vow… surely you can find it in yourself to give just this one pirate a chance, can't you? I promise I won't run about setting fire to Port Royal and looting my father's mansion. I'll be good. I promise."

For me… as a wedding gift… Norrington had sworn he would never fall for this again, but Elizabeth's enthusiasm was so enchanting that he found himself nodding and squeezing her hand. "If you wish. Good luck."

He backed into the crowd, frowning. Elizabeth had clearly not thought this whole thing through – yes, she was putting the mark where nobody would see, but here were two dozen of her future neighbors and hired help all watching it happen! Well, he thought, in for a penny, in for a pound. He would provide them with an alternate story – the crazed pirate captain brands a mark of ownership onto his beautiful young captive, perhaps – and force them to believe it or at least pretend to.

Next, Norrington confronted the problem of whether to watch or not to watch. He wasn't sure he could bear either way.

Barbossa went around behind her and opened the neck of her undershirt enough to pull it down to her elbow. He took the brand from the fire and held it carefully away from her with one hand while he moved her hair out of the way with the other. She was shivering. So was he, because he'd forgotten and used the damn right arm again, but it passed quickly. He touched Elizabeth's shoulder and asked, "Ready, Miss Elizabeth?" He hadn't meant to sound amused but he couldn't help it.

"Y-yes?"

"Let's try that again, shall we. And you might try breathin – it helps." He watched her shoulders drop as she relaxed. "Ready, Miss Elizabeth?"

She swallowed and raised her head. "Yes."

He put his bad arm around her, rode out the pain of moving it, and then pulled her in until her opposite shoulderblade was flush against his ribcage. "Deep breath, now, miss," he drawled. He felt her chest expand. He pressed the brand into her.

There was a tiny, reflexive jerk that he contained easily by squeezing her tighter. Then there was a pause during which he smelled the burn but she did not yet feel it, and then just after he pulled the brand away, she let loose a bloodcurdling shriek and pitched forward.

Barbossa dropped the iron into a water barrel so that he had both hands free. "All right, all right, missie, it's over," he said, laughing despite his best efforts.

She continued to scream and thrash, her back arched so far he was afraid he would do damage to herself. He took her by the upper arms carefully and turned her around. She was still going. He leaned close so that he could be heard over her noise. "Feel free to stop screamin whenever you can," he shouted into her ear.

She bit him in the shoulder – hard. He hissed. Fortunately it was his good shoulder, but still, she was so berserk that it hurt even through the coat and shirt.

Finally she subsided from screams into whimpers, and then they could hear Will shouting at the top of his lungs from down below. Elizabeth, coming back to herself now, looked around and noticed that everyone had come up on deck in response to the awful noise. The mark hurt something fierce and she desperately wanted to grab at it, but for one thing it was on her back and where she couldn't reach, and for another, grabbing on was probably not the best idea with a spanking-new burn.

She knew that doing something would distract her from it. Aha. There was her father, on deck now, in a panic and being held back by Norrington. That was something to do. She went over, forcing a smile for him.

Norrington used his sternest glares to get everyone to back up and give them privacy. He correctly predicted that Elizabeth would immediately assure her father that she was fine and in fact was glad to have the brand. This was not something that respectable Port Royal citizens needed to overhear. "Think of it as a memento of my disorderly youth, Father," she joked through her tears. "I promise I'll settle down after this."

Norrington let go, and Governor Swann adjusted his collar. "Well. You had just better," he said, trying to sound cross instead of still reeling with his fear for her. Those screams… He had almost fainted. "Come here, child."

He folded her into his arms, careful to hold her low across the back so he wouldn't accidentally touch the burn. "We'll have your nurse blow on it to make it better as soon as we get home," he murmured.

She laughed and then was really finished crying for good.

Swann let go of her and stepped back. "Oh, dear - where did your pirate go?"

Elizabeth looked all around and followed the crew's uneasy glances to the hold. "Will..." she breathed. Will was probably beside himself by now. There was no telling what Barbossa would say to him, but it was not likely to be comforting. She rushed off to get down there before one of them got himself killed.

"What have you done to her?" Will's voice was hoarse - he had literally screamed his throat raw when he heard her.

Barbossa heaved a sigh and moved slowly towards him until he stood just out of grabbing distance through the bars. "Upstairs, Jack," he said without taking his eyes from Will. "And keep Elizabeth out until I say."

"You're the devil, mate," Jack chuckled. He went.

"Well? Tell me if she's all right! Tell me now or I'll hunt you down, wherever you go, and, and I'll carve you to pieces, you and that filthy monkey of yours."

"The monkey… now that be a nice touch," Barbossa acknowledged with real admiration. "Oh, don't worry your pretty little head, Turner. I said I'd scar her for life and I have. But other than that, she'll be fine."

Will shook the bars. "What's that supposed to mean? Unlock this door and I swear I'll kill you!"

"Thank ye, but in that case I think I'll keep the door locked." The captain held out a bottle. "Have a drink."

Will was holding on to the bars so hard his hands hurt. "Put that bottle down and come a little closer."

"Why?"

"So that I can hit you, without making you drop a perfectly good bottle of rum."

Barbossa laughed, amused and still in a too good a mood to be worried. He put his bottle down, and took a step closer. "Now listen, Tur-"

But Will hadn't been kidding. His hands shot out and just caught Barbossa's collar before Barbossa could jump back. He jerked him forward so savagely that his face smashed into the bars, then punched him as hard as he could in the shoulder. He was spot on – the bloodstain made a very clear target.

Bet you regret it now, teaching me to always hit where it hurts, Will thought gleefully. Barbossa crumpled and Will followed him to the ground. He knew he'd have a few seconds before the pirate could get himself together again, and he wanted to use them to take the keys away. Will was down on one knee, reaching through the bars fumbling around with both hands, when he felt Barbossa start to move purposefully towards him. So he gave up on the keys, and instead got a two-handed grip around Barbossa's neck and squeezed. "Unlock this door."

"Let go," Barbossa wheezed, "If y're ever plannin on walking again."

"What?" Will didn't ease up. All of a sudden he felt an unpleasant tickling at his heel. He looked down and saw why Barbossa wasn't fighting against the stranglehold: both hands were busy. One was holding Will's foot down and the other was holding a knife against the tendon behind his ankle.

Will's first instinct was to let go and jerk away, but he fought it. Running scared was not how one negotiated with a pirate. "If you cut me, I swear before God you won't leave this hold alive," he panted. He knew he was at a disadvantage – he was reluctant to kill people, while Barbossa could probably maim him any day of the week without batting an eye. Still, the longer he hung on, the less the captain would count on that reluctance. He could feel the cartilage creaking beneath his fingers. How long could a pirate hold his breath anyway?

"Your choice, boy." Barbossa managed to twist his head far enough to make eye contact. "But it's a mistake y'll regret for the rest of your long, lonely life as a cripple." He rasped in what air he could and then, eyes glowing, continued: "A life which – after Elizabeth runs off to World's End to find me – ye will spend wonderin… whether she and I are off sailin the seas together… or whether she just died on the way."

Barbossa also knew how to hit where it hurt. Will was so enraged that his hands spasmed without his permission.

But although the choking sound the captain made was music to his ears, Will knew perfectly well he was going to have to let go soon. For one thing, although it killed him to admit it, Barbossa was probably right. For another, he suspected that as soon as his victim was unconscious he would let go anyway. Strangling someone to death after they'd gone limp was just not his cup of tea.

He squeezed for a moment more, savoring it, and then let go and stood up.

Barbossa let go as well, and sat back on his heels. "Brilliant," he snarled.

"Sorry." As the adrenaline faded, Will finally got a handle on most of his anxiety. If Barbossa could be down here taunting him, and there was still no ruckus up on deck, the chances that something truly heinous had happened to Elizabeth were minimal. He hated not to know for sure, but obviously behaving like a wild animal was not the answer. He took a deep breath. Barbossa was on his feet, holding out the bottle to him through the bars. "Thanks but I don't drink."

"You should start." The pirate's voice was a mess and Will actually did feel sorry. "You could use a little unwindin. And it's a shame when a man's wife holds her liquor better than he can."

"Wife…" Will took the bottle warily and uncorked it. "So someone's told you? We're going to be married here, on the Pearl, any day now."

"Aye. I heard." He took out his flask and watched Will expectantly. Will raised the bottle to his lips. "A toast, idiot." When Will still seemed unsure of what to do, he held out his flask. "To a long and happy marriage for Mr. and Mrs. William Turner."

They clinked bottles and drank. Will made a horrible face. "You drink this for fun?" Barbossa only shrugged. Will took another sip and swallowed it all down. It felt like he did better with the face this time…

Barbossa nodded at him with a knowing smile. "Aye, better."

"Smug bullying bastard." Will put the bottle down on the ground and clasped his hands behind his back. "All right – I've taken a drink, and you've made me miserable. Now will you please let me out to see Elizabeth?"

Barbossa laughed and took the keys out. "Fair enough, Mr. Turner. Run and see what's been done to your lady." He unlocked the cell, but as Will made to shove by him he grabbed his arm and growled, "Ye dare not make her feel badly about it. Or I'll give ye one to match."

Will's stomach was rolling slowly, and he didn't think it was the rum. He swallowed down the urge to vomit, and hurried past Barbossa to climb up on deck.

TBC…

Sorry, sorry, this was so long we didn't get to see Will's reaction yet! But don't worry, it'll be here soon. So will the wedding. (After, of course, Will gets a bachelor party of sorts.)

Nope, I'm not going to get into what Barbossa was really thinking, because I'm not sure. But I can totally see him doing it this way. I just don't know why. I don't think he would cut her hair – she's too pretty!