Disclaimer: I do not own Captain Jack Sparrow or Elizabeth Swann (Disney does). I only play with them from time to time.

A/N: My beta is still wonderful. I don't know if this'll have an epilogue or not. Probably not. I'm not done with these characters anyway (or they're not done with me, depending on how one looks at it), so there'll be a whole other fic or two dealing with the "afterwards," as it were. And I'm not telling you what the Greek means til the end, because it'll ruin the whole chapter.

Chapter Four: Kathupakouô

Elizabeth stared.

"Jack…" she said, slowly. "What are you asking?"

"Well I thought that'd be pretty obvious love. I'm asking you to…Lizzie?"

Elizabeth was looking at the ring with all the terrified fascination of an animal caught in a snake's gaze, remembering another hand, another ring.

"No," she whispered, shaking her head. She could feel the rain on her face, hear the boom of the cannons and the screams of the dying…Her eyes flickered up to Jack's face, wide and dark with fear, not really seeing him.

"No," she said again, backing away.

"Lizzie?" Jack swore under his breath. This was not how it was supposed to go. He took a step forward, reached toward her. She stumbled back a few more steps, arms crossed over her chest as if afraid she would fly to pieces.

"Don't touch me!" she said, her voice rising. Jack stopped, his brown eyes warm with concern, so reminiscent of another pair. She turned her back towards him, unwilling to let him see her like this. Dammit, a part of her thought. And here I'd been doing so well…

She squeezed her own eyes shut and tried to steady her breathing. She hated this, the sudden surge of recollection, the random moments of frozen panic, the flash-floods of memories from the fragile dam of her self-control. Will appeared before her mind's eye, his face—

—streaked with rain like the tears she had no time to shed. In his palm lay what was to be his wedding ring, the one they'd picked out together, a plain gold band, simple, pure. Like him, she'd teased. Like their love, he'd countered.

"What are you saying?" she asked, terrified, horrified.

Will's brown eyes black in the half-dark of the storm. Unreadable. Not hers.

"I'm sorry, Elizabeth. I can't."

Will's voice, quiet, but she could always hear him.

The ring fell from her numb fingers and landed in a puddle, gleaming against the dark wood of the deck.

Will's back, as he turned and walked away through the battle.

Will, leaving her. Forever.

The memories faded. Elizabeth took stock of her surroundings. She was still standing, at least. The sun had come up sometime during their time together, filtering through the ceiling of the cave and pooling on the floor. She just let herself breathe for a moment, ignoring Jack's anxious gaze on her back. She straightened up, a slow, deliberate reclaiming of herself from her past. She opened her eyes, lifted her head, and turned to face him.

"What do you want, Jack?" she asked, her voice cool.

"Want?" he echoed.

"Yes. Want," she said. "You obviously still want something, although by my reckoning, all my debts to you are paid."

"Is that what you think this is?" he asked, incredulous. "Payment?"

"I can fathom no other reason for it. What good is a mad girl with a broken crown on her head and blood on her hands?" she asked, sarcasm dripping from her voice as she recited the words so many had called her. "I can't even bear children."

"What the hell does that have to do with anything?" he asked, furiously. "Bloody hell, Liz, can't a man just want you for your own sake?"

"Not a pirate, Jack. And you are. So, I ask you again: What do you want from me?"

"Just the pleasure of your sweet company, love," Jack said, his voice sardonic.

Elizabeth rolled her eyes, and turned away as if to leave. Jack caught her shoulder, unwilling to let her go without a damn good reason. She stiffened.

"Kindly remove your hand, Captain."

"No, I bloody won't. Not 'til you answer my question. Lizzie…Why don't you believe me?"

She spun around, eyes flashing.

"Because I know you, Jack. It's the quest that delights you, the chase you love. Once you have what you're after, you lose interest entirely."

Jack snorted.

"I wouldn't 'have' you, Captain Swann. No one ever could. I pity the poor sod who tries."

"Oh, yes, that's a sure way to win a girl's heart."

"Oh? And how does one win your heart, pray tell?" he asked, acid bitter on his tongue.

"I have no heart to win, Jack Sparrow," she said flatly. He looked at her.

"You really believe that, don't you?"

Elizabeth regarded him steadily.

"I don't have to."

Jack said nothing, just stared at the ground.

"You're breakin' my heart, love," he said, after a moment.

"Yes, well, I think all this treasure is worth a broken heart or two, so if you'll excuse me…" She turned around and walked toward the entrance, skirting a patch of sunshine as though it would burn her.

"No," said Jack, quietly, still staring at the ground. "It's not."

Something in his voice made her turn back, look at his dark shape through the light. He looked up at her, a small, sad smile on his face.

"It may be worth my heart a few times over, but it's not worth you. Nothing's worth you."

Elizabeth stared at him.

"I wept that morning, you know," he said, conversationally. "After you left."

"Why?"

He shrugged.

"I dunno. Because I love you, I suppose."

She shook her head. "No, Jack—"

"Yes," he said, simply. "I do."

"No, you don't!" she shouted. "You don't love me! You don't even know me! The girl you loved is dead, Jack, she died the day I was born. I'm not Miss Elizabeth Swann, I'm not the governor's daughter—"

"Well, that's bloody fine with me, darlin', because I never loved that prissy Miss Elizabeth Swann. I love the woman who left me to die and wasn't sorry, the woman for whom men fought a war against the Devil himself and won, the woman who takes what she wants and damns the consequences. And you want me, love, don't deny it. I've seen that fire in your eyes, I know the heat you feel when you're near me, seen the way you shiver beneath my touch, and I know it for what it is, 'cos you do the same damn thing to me. Elizabeth…" He looked at her through the shaft of sunlight, an impassable gulf between them.

"Lizzie. I never wanted her. I want you."

"I'm not who you think I am, Jack."

"Oh? And who are you then? Please, tell me, for I would dearly like to know."

She regarded him for a moment, her eyes unreadable, and then took one step toward him, one step to bring her into the light. Jack blinked.

Her shirt, now dry, glowed crimson and, her skin shone sunkissed bronze, but her hair…her hair blazed up, incarnadine streaking through the blonde waves like dolphins, twining and spreading through the curls like scarlet ribbons in the water. She glowed red and gold in the sunlight, the colors of blood and greed and piracy, the essence of their chosen lives distilled into one beautiful, dangerous woman with eyes like chips of amber and Lilith's own smile.

"I am the Scarlet Swan," she said, simply.

It was a name he had originally heard whispered the first few days after The Battle, after the world had seen Elizabeth unleashed in all her unholy glory, soaked in other people's blood, eyes glowing with the lust for more. He'd heard it since then too, every time they'd made port, every time a few pirates gathered together for a moment of company in the corners of taverns or under the all-seeing eye of the moon. And he'd known it was her they spoke of in the darkness, voices hushed with reverence and taut with desire and tinged with fear. Known it was his Lizzie, all grown up.

He took a step forward and reached out a wondering hand to finger the scarlet.

"Aye," he said, after a moment "Y'are. But you are also Elizabeth. You speak of being owned, of belonging to, and yet I don't think you realize the Scarlet Swan is owned. She belongs to the Brethren, to her subjects. She's a symbol, Lizzie, a newborn legend, and do you know what legends do? They grow, and they grow until the stories eclipse the maker and suddenly you're trying to outdo your own deeds, trying to measure up to your own exaggerated standard, trying to beat yourself at your own game, and who can do that? They take and they take until there's no 'you' left, only a name and a fear. She'll swallow you whole, Liz, and she won't even spit out the bones."

Jack's voice was hard, and held a bitterness that could only be born of long knowledge, yet his eyes looked at Elizabeth almost pleadingly.

"You speak of freedom, and that's all I offer to you. Freedom, Liz. No pretensions, no stories, no acts. This needn't be marriage proposal, merely a promise of a place where you can just be Elizabeth. Just a place where you can be."

"Where, Jack?" Elizabeth looked at him, her voice little more than a whisper, tears glimmering in her golden eyes, cracking the façade she worked so hard to build. "Where?"

He took another step forward and enfolded her in his arms, resting his cheek against her bright head.

"Here, love. Always here."

Kathupakouô consent. See, told you it'd ruin it.