Chapter 8

The brownish piece of soap lay in her right hand like a heavy stone, almost counterbalancing the bucket she was carrying with her left; the water Elizabeth had fetched from the pump outside was bright and clean, a stark contrast to the copper-coloured sludge that had filled the bowls and cans they'd used to wash away the blood during the surgery. She found the cleaner water more disturbing; it had nothing to do with surgery and everything to do with the man who lay on her table. Jack was still lying on her kitchen table, a white bandage adorning his chest to soak up the blood still seeping from the open wound. While she could have easily borne the sight of an angry bullet hole, she found it impossible to gaze at his stripped form, more impossible still to give his body a sponge bath.

No, she decided, Kate would have to do this alone. After all, the midwife didn't know him, had never talked to him or kissed him - 'Killed. Never killed him,' the nagging voice inside her mind corrected - and in the unlikely case that he should wake, she would be the one to bear his sarcasm. There was no way that she, Elizabeth Turner, should face Jack Sparrow as naked as his mother bore him.

Setting down the bucket in front of the kitchen door, she called for Kate to hand her the soap, reluctant to turn her head in a direction that might make her eyes catch sight of something she didn't want to see.

"Do you have water and soap? Then bring it in!" Kate's voice came from inside; judging by the scent floating past Elizabeth's nostrils, she was burning sage.

"I …," she began, and then realized she sounded like one of those foolish girls she had despised in the days when she'd been living in her father's custody; she could envision them fainting or cackling like crows at the mere thought of a naked male lying on their kitchen table. On the other hand, this was her kitchen table, and the man lying on it …

"I can't," her voice squeaked, hardly louder than a whisper of wind.

"Bollocks. Come in." It was unmistakably clear that Kate wouldn't tolerate any excuses, and the ones Elizabeth had come up with were flimsy indeed. With a deep sigh and a grit of her teeth, she picked up the bucket again and tip-toed into the kitchen like a timid fawn, careful to keep her gaze fixed on a pitiful looking potted plant on the window sill.

"If it's of any comfort to you: He has nothing you or I haven't already seen," she heard Kate say, and there was no avoiding the bemused chuckle in her voice. Elizabeth found it somewhat hard to believe, considering Jack's legendary status, but then again, legends didn't get themselves shot, so perhaps other parts of him were human as well. That didn't mean, however, she actually wanted to be acquainted with them. Studying the plant's brownish leafs, which looked almost as unhealthy as Jack's ashen face, she clumsily put the bucket down; a considerable amount of water splashed on the floor, and following its liquid trace, Elizabeth thought that some watering might do her house plants good as well.

She was on the verge of searching for her long neglected watering can when a heart rendering moan, followed by an inarticulate stream of words brought her back to reality and the task at hand. Rumbling noises arose behind her, like someone was pushing a heavy piece of furniture, and Kate's suppressed groan told her that Jack was probably caught in a feverish dream, thrashing about and flailing.

"Elizabeth, for heaven's sake …," the harassed midwife gasped, "help me hold him down or he will tear himself open!"

"Better to tear himself open than take me apart for seeing his privates," Elizabeth thought in desperation, and before she could prevent it, she'd said the words out loud.

"I need you to hold down his shoulders, not his privates," Kate said behind clenched teeth, considerably out of breath and more than irritated by Elizabeth's uncharacteristically prudish behaviour.

She knew her husband's Captain as a strong-willed and independent woman who had never shied from whatever life's confusing trails demanded from her, but ever since Captain Teague's unlucky son had come into play, Kate hardly recognized her.

There could be no doubt in Kate's mind that there had been more to their past relationship than had met the eye. Tai – blind as ever when it came to those things – hadn't been able to perceive it but there would be plenty of time to inquire about that later. She needed to coax Elizabeth's help before Jack, who, in his agony, had developed remarkable powers would knock her off her feet. "If he gets himself hurt, we might need to fetch Billy again."

The threatening prospect of the surgeon's return worked as a better motivator than Kate had dared to expect; slowly, Elizabeth turned around, her eyes squeezed shut as if afraid to be blinded by the light.

"Drop the soap into the bucket and come here," Kate commanded sharply, using the stern voice normally reserved for panicking husbands on the verge of fainting even though it was their wives doing all the work. Surprisingly, it helped; Elizabeth finally looked up, momentarily petrified, but she managed to summon her strength. She rushed to the other woman's side, pressing her complete weight down on Jack's jerking shoulder.

The resistant fight he had managed throughout the surgery had done nothing to wear him out, and they were both struggling to calm his quaking body, still convulsing under heavy attacks of fever. Kate watched Elizabeth intently as she pulled one of her hands free and rested it on Jack's scorching forehead, unusually exposed without his headscarf. Leaning over him, she forced herself to focus on his twisted face. "Jack," she said firmly, repeating his name, over again until he calmed. Breathing heavily, he submitted to her touch and pressed his cheek against the palm of her hand. Elizabeth lifted her head, a relieved smile brightening her strained features, and Kate returned the smile. "Well done," she whispered with some admiration, wondering how the younger woman in all her nervousness had managed to reassure him with just her voice; apparently, even his unconscious form appreciated her presence.

With all the anxiety Jack's seizure had created, Elizabeth had nearly forgotten about his delicate condition. Muscles aching, she straightened herself and stepped back, only to find herself facing a battered human body the nakedness of which only added to his undignified situation. The strings she felt latch to her heart ever since she'd recognized Jack's face on the beach were frayed to the point of tearing, but she found she couldn't look away. She was hypnotized by the pitiful sight that almost seemed like a silent accusation to her, reminding her of events better banished to memory, a wealth of words regretted and left unspoken.

Without the attire and grand gestures, the great Captain she'd read about in her youth crumbled to dust, never to be revived again. Elizabeth had never perceived Jack as a tall man, but his rather impressive ego had always made up for the missing inches. Lying on her kitchen table, unconscious and bloodied, she couldn't help but recognize that he was rather small in physique, not much taller than herself and considerably smaller than Will.

The hard work he carried out at sea had provided him with a well-muscled chest, strong arms and thighs, but even several layers of muscle couldn't disguise his agitating loss of weight. Beneath the bandage covering his wound, his ribcage was clearly visible, and if she had dared to have a closer look at lower regions, she would have been sure to find protruding hipbones, the left one graced by the artfully inked image of a Chinese dragon that wound itself across his hip and thigh. Finally, Elizabeth managed to tear her eyes away. Squeezing her eyes shut, she swallowed hard in a fruitless attempt to get rid of the lump that had taken up residence inside her throat.

"Not a pretty sight," she heard a comforting voice behind her say, followed with a hand that rested lightly on her shoulder. Unnoticed by Elizabeth's overstretched mind, Kate had left her place at Jack's side, sensing that it was no longer their patient who was in need of her comfort. "You knew him well, did you?"

Elizabeth nodded, still unable to talk. It was all becoming too much to bear; Jack's return, accompanied by the strain and anxiety of the surgery, and now the discovery that not only his injury, but years and life had taken their toll on Jack Sparrow. In her memory, his image had always been that of the legendary rogue, unchanging like the rocks, but the man who had braved death itself more than once was no more—and surprisingly, it hurt. "It's been ten years," she whispered tonelessly, as if to convince herself. "No, almost eleven," she added, thinking that it should matter, somehow.

"It's a shame, really." The midwife seemed to be reading Elizabeth's thoughts, her thumb rubbing softly across the younger woman's shoulder. "I think that under different circumstances and in another life, he'd have been one of those who age well. There's not a single white hair on his body."

The mere thought of spots on Jack's body that might grow hair made Elizabeth spin around so unexpectedly that Kate almost fell backwards; in a quick-thinking motion, she grabbed both of Elizabeth's shoulders, holding herself steady, but her saviour's body was limp and if it hadn't been for the table coming in their way, they both would have collapsed to the floor.

"Elizabeth, what the bloody hell is wrong with you?" Kate shot at Elizabeth, out of breath and unwilling to endure any more of the persisting absurdity.

"You two had something of a romantic understanding, am I right?" It was by no means a profound suspicion, more of a stab in the dark, but the immediate reaction it provoked seemed to suggest a hit.

Elizabeth gasped for air, then retorted a little too sharply: "Don't be silly. Of course we didn't! I was already in love with Will when I met Jack."

"Love doesn't have anything to do with it," Kate stated as a matter of fact. "He may be bruised and battered now, but he wasn't ten years ago. And besides, he has quite a reputation…"

Glaring at the midwife as if she was trying to petrify her with her stare, Elizabeth struggled for words, a rarity in her life. There was no denying she felt as though she were child caught pilfering sweets from the pantry. Not due to Kate's words, of course, for they held no truth at all, but because she had let her emotions get the best of her. There was no talking herself out of this – oh how she envied Jack for that skill! – and to limit the extent of the damage her behaviour had caused, in this case, probably called for the tiniest part of a half-truth.

"I was 20," she began slowly, still uncertain of what she wished to confide, but Kate was quick to offer aide.

"Is that supposed to be a 'yes'?" she inquired insistently, cocking her head in a demanding gesture that seemed designed to ferret out the truth. Elizabeth felt cornered, and seeing that Kate wouldn't rest until she'd gotten a partially satisfying answer, she decided on a well-measured step into dangerous territory.

"Well, his looks were not exactly that of an ogre, so maybe I suppose I was temporarily infatuated with him. But it was short lived and I never got any closer than …" She realized she was babbling, speaking too fast in a voice that was too high-pitched to be taken seriously, and Kate's curled lips and narrowed eyebrows were quick to remind her of it.

"Very well, I may have kissed him." Her insides seemed to transform into a tight ball at her own words, and unable to stomach the memory of the kiss they'd shared onboard the Black Pearl, much less its consequences, she directed her thoughts to the previous afternoon's near-kiss, surprised it had survived in her memory for so many years. "Almost."

Kate unleashed an angry snort, her face coated in thinly-veiled scepticism, but before she could come up with a reply that would have been dripping with sarcasm, no doubt, Jack came to Elizabeth's rescue. With a mournful cough, he reminded the two quarrelling women of his presence, and Elizabeth had to stop herself from spinning around guiltily at the realization she'd momentarily forgotten about the state he was in. Kate, on the other hand, found it difficult to suppress her disappointment at the lost opportunity to press a very promising story out of the Pirate King herself, but professionalism won over curiosity and she commanded with returned practice: "Let's get this over with and tuck him into bed. He needs warmth and rest if he wants a chance at survival. Since you've already kissed him, I suggest you take care of his face so you don't have to deal with any unfamiliar parts. I'll take the rest."

Long minutes were passed in heavy silence, the air between Kate and Elizabeth so thick it was nearly tangible. In any other situation, Elizabeth would have admired Kate for being straightforward and self-confident, but it was a unique experience to suddenly find herself at the receiving end of the midwife's stinging tongue. Even as a child, she'd hated being chided, and age hadn't exactly softened her temper. The distinct sting of having been outwitted was nagging heavily at her pride, and knowing that in her present condition, she wouldn't have stood a chance didn't help much, either. Kate Heung had made her look like a fool in front of Jack, and she could only pray that their exchange hadn't mysteriously found its way into his subconscious where it would most certainly arise to haunt her in form of endless teasing.

The water-filled bowl she'd placed on a stool next to the table was slopping over when she plunged the sponge in violently, and she had some trouble reigning in her temper so she didn't smack it hard across Jack's forehead.

Not for the first time, her life was on the verge of being pulled down a familiar maelstrom, a vortex of sheer trouble, and again, it was his fault. While she let the cooling liquid trickle on his heated skin, she wondered which strange twist of fate had brought him to Shipwreck City with a bullet in his chest.

In all the stir Will's discovery had created, she'd completely forgotten about the man that had threatened her boy, and now it was probably too late to go in search for him. Whoever had brought Jack here had navigated the rocks in a boat small enough to hide in the inlet down on the beach – a suicide mission, even for someone who knew the waters surrounding the Cove, and it was unlikely one of Jack's crewmembers, no matter how devoted, would have succeeded.

Near the open window, a seagull let out a mournful cry, and Elizabeth winced, pausing in her movement to look out into the blazing midday sun. Nothing unusual, a cloudless blue sky, and yet, it was different. It might have been a change in the wind or a turn of tide, too vague for her tired senses to discern, but there was something unsettlingly different about the day. She remembered a similar feeling of foreboding and change, years ago, when white sails had breached the horizon on her wedding day, and since that fateful afternoon, her life had never been the same again.

Forcing her attention back to Jack, she was relieved to find that the flailing had stopped. He was still shifting and moaning, but the dream he was caught in, though anything but peaceful, had lost its initial violence and horror. Elizabeth wrung out the sponge and began cleansing his eyes, carefully wiping away the remnants of dirt and crusted tears that stuck to his lids until she'd worked herself down to what looked like faint shades of kohl. It was strangely reassuring to find something she could immediately connect to the Jack Sparrow she'd once known, even though the paint was now covering a multitude of small creases surrounding his eyes which hadn't been there before; or perhaps she'd never taken notice of them.

"How old is he?" Kate's voice interrupted her musings, her casual interest clearly meant to be a peace offering and Elizabeth took it up gladly.

"I don't know …" Which was the truth, she suddenly realized. She had never given much thought to Jack's age, probably because years didn't touch a legend, but now found herself wondering about it. "He might be in his forties …," she guessed vaguely. "Though he may be older. You should ask Captain Teague, he'll probably know."

Elizabeth didn't turn her head for fear of another glimpse of Jack's naked form in its entire glory, but she could see from the corner of her eye Kate shrug her shoulders in resignation, unable to believe that one could even develop as much as a childish fascination for someone without knowing their age or history.

"He's been through a lot … obviously," she finally said, wisely refraining from another pointless confrontation. "I know Tai had some rough encounters in his life, but he looks nothing like that."

Elizabeth didn't have to look to know she was right. Jack Sparrow might have sacked Nassau Port without firing one single shot, but the stories didn't mention the bullets he'd caught himself, much less the flogging he'd received or the horrifying scar on his left forearm.

"He survived some kind of fire in the past … he has a rather spacious burn scar on his right thigh," Kate went on with her observations. "And another one on his side. I wonder where he got them." Her last sentence was spoken with emphasis, and Elizabeth sensed that she was trying to wring further secrets out of her – secrets as hidden to her as they were to the midwife. Jack's whole life, to her, had always been a thicket of lies and deception, punctuated with scattered glades of truth the number of which was far too small to answer only one of Kate's unspoken questions.

"I have no idea, Kate," Elizabeth said, sounding impatient and strained. "I know next to nothing about him. We sailed together, we fought in the same battle and he saved Will's life. Well, he might have saved mine, too. That doesn't mean he cared to tell me his entire story from birth."

"So am I to believe that Elizabeth Swann, the governor's daughter, met a pirate and didn't ask him one single question?"

Elizabeth sighed. For once in his life, Jack had been right: If you wanted someone to believe you dishonest, you only had to tell the truth. With a smirk, she wondered how Kate would react to Jack's pompous revelations on himself, and how long it would take him to make her lose her temper.

"I strongly advise you to wait until he wakes and ask as many questions as you'd like," she smiled slyly. "It will be interesting to see what you make of his replies."

For a split second, she felt a tang of triumph, but it was quickly shattered by Kate's painfully accurate realism. "I might not get that chance."

The blunt statement retrieved a truth she'd almost managed to block: Jack had survived the surgery, but the waters he was sailing were still far from the road to recovery. With an unexpected tenderness that came as a surprise, she brought the sponge to the sweat-slicked skin on his throat and ran it down across his collarbone until the bandage got in the way. He felt unnaturally hot, and she couldn't shake off the feeling that despite the cooling water, his temperature was steadily rising She knew enough of wound healing to know that the fever would eventually lead to either his recovery or his death, but with every passing minute, it grew more difficult for her to believe that he'd ever manage to escape the delirium his body was imposing on him.

Wracked with guilt at her dismissive words, she found herself unable to bear his pain-contorted face any longer and picked up the bowl to pour its contents into an empty wine barrel and replace it with fresh water from the bucket. She was about to turn her attention back to Jack's burning face and upper body when something caught her eye. Though the whole of his portrait, a still life in muted colours seemed distorted, one feature was so decidedly wrong Elizabeth's mouth fell open in silent protest when she'd finally made it out. The lower half of Jack's face, up to his aristocratic cheekbones, was covered in what looked like a rat's nest, and the unkempt strands of hair surrounding his features didn't exactly distract from the impression of his being a wild man. Clicking her tongue energetically, Elizabeth made her decision. What little dignity there was left for Jack to have, he should be allowed to keep – and not once throughout their acquaintance had his beard looked anything but tidy, and whatever one might have thought of his hair, he'd always taken great pains to make it look clean and reasonably neat. In fact, it had been the only part of him he'd apparently cared to wash from time to time. Putting the bowl back onto the stool, Elizabeth turned and walked out of the kitchen, her steps resolute and certain almost buoyant with the realization that she finally knew what to do.

"Where are you're going?" Kate called after her, awaiting another outburst or display of unjustified panic, but Elizabeth's reply came promptly: "Fetching a comb – and Will's shaving kit!"