Preface
damn your love, damn your lies
Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at /works/38119597.
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply Category: M/M Fandom: Our Flag Means Death (TV) Relationship: Blackbeard Edward Teach/Stede Bonnet, Mary Allamby Bonnet & Stede Bonnet, Blackbeard Edward Teach & Mary Allamby Bonnet Character: Stede Bonnet, Blackbeard Edward Teach, Chauncey Badminton, Mary Allamby Bonnet, Alma Bonnet, Louis Bonnet Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fix-It, Hurt/Comfort, weirdly mary-centric for a fic i didn't intend to be mary-centric, not sure if it's ethical to play relationship counsellor when you're in love with one of the people, but you do you ed, 'so if ed doesn't immediately go back to the ship did the mutiny succeed?' i hear you ask, and the answer is yes. yes it did :), rip izzy hands and long live captain oluwande, BI MARY BI MARY BI MARY, im screaming and crying @ the fandom you can like someone you don't love!!, stede wasn't under the impression that his good pal ed was making out with him platonically, he's just never experienced real romantic love before okay cut him some slack, Angst with a Happy Ending, Getting Together, Friends to Lovers, hot take but i'm into ed's shaved look Language: English Collections: Ed and Mary meet, OFMD: You write fine fics well, Just... So cute..., Soft AU, here are your names and here is the list and here are the things you left behind @ stede bonnet Stats: Published: 2022-04-02 Words: 7,031 Chapters: 1/1 damn your love, damn your lies
by ObsessedWithFandom
Summary
What if Badminton pulled the trigger?
Notes
well i was so obsessed with the ep9 ed waiting on the dock part, and it made me realise that if stede had actually died at the hands of admiral badminton (which would never have happened, thank you david jenkins), NOTHING would have changed on ed's side. he still would've thought stede abandoned him.
so enjoy the product of that brainrot
oh yeah, almost forgot to say, title from fleetwood mac's the chain. because, yeah. also why would i save it for anything actually angsty and gut-wrenching when i can use it for this silly little fix-it fic??
warnings: blood, gunshot wounds, and mentions of leeches. i think that's it, but be sure to let me know!
UPDATE: wtf guys this fic ended up in a youtube video!! (the chain by fleetwood mac as ao3 titles, duh.) here it is if you want to check it out. it's amazing (and i'm not just saying that because my fic is in it )
See the end of the work for more notes
damn your love, damn your lies
Badminton's finger tightens on the trigger — Stede squeezes his eyes shut — the sound of a shot —
Stede screams once, in fear. And then he screams in pain.
He'd — he'd actually shot him. Somehow, even with rage in his eyes and a gun in his hand, Stede hadn't thought Badminton would actually go through with it.
And despite considering himself somewhat of a connoisseur of pain — he'd been stabbed, twice, in his life! — Stede finds himself wholly unprepared for the sensation of a gunshot wound. His knees give way. The impact as they meet the earth judders through his entire body. Stede groans. Is the air supposed to look so spotty?
Badminton is laughing. Somewhere far, far away. "I got him! I got him, brother. I shot him through the heart, and now the plague is finally defeated. We have our revenge."
The Revenge… Stede struggles awake, mind grappling with the grasping tentacles of sleep. His ship.
Their ship.
And then the rest of what Badminton said filters in. He frowns; brings a hand, with some difficulty, to his heart. But there's no blood there. It's only when he moves the hand lower, to his stomach, that he feels wetness. Stede smiles weakly, even as his arm flops numbly back to the ground. He hopes Ed will be pleased.
There's the distant sound of a scuffle, and the bang! of another gunshot. Stede doesn't even feel it hit.
Edward, he thinks, and then nothing further.
When he comes to, it's starting to get light, and he's alone. At least, that's what Stede thinks, until he turns his head and meets the staring eyes of Badminton.
Or rather, eye.
Stede shrieks, then curls into himself as the motion pulls at his wound. Badminton doesn't shriek, because he seems to be quite dead. It takes Stede a few moments to breathe through the nausea. He can't help but see Badminton — the other one — in this one's place. A hole through one eye. The other open and soulless. Dead because of Stede.
Maybe, if he were in a better state, Stede would use this moment to re-evaluate his entire life (again). The people he's left behind. The people he's dragging down with him. As it stands, though, thoughts keep slipping away from him like silvery fish in dark water; flashing brightly and then gone. He can feel the urge to lie back down and slip away, but there's a loud and increasingly insistent part of him that knows he'll never get up again.
Stede braces his arm around his stomach, and with the stiff upper lip that got him through a decade's worth of a loveless marriage, levers himself up. Just that effort is enough to make his supporting arm shake and buckle, but he grits his teeth and pushes, until finally he's back on his feet.
The change in perspective doesn't improve the scene any. Badminton: still dead. The ground Stede was lying on: covered in blood. There are crows in the trees. Waiting. Waiting for him to die, or at least to stop moving. Stede can't cover his face as he weeps, because his one hand actually got stuck to his front with dried blood, sometime while he was asleep, but he makes do with the other.
He wants to go home.
Ed — where is Ed? He needs to find Ed.
Stede stumbles away without a second glance behind him, his mind already far away and in the grasp of a beautiful man. A siren, calling him to the rocks beneath the lighthouse.
You're useless, something in him whispers. Too wounded. Too pathetic. He won't want you anymore, you know. But Stede's feet have already pointed their way, and he clings to that with all he has. He has no idea where he's going, but that has never stopped Ed and him. They always find a way. They always find their way back to each other.
Afterwards, his memory of the entire journey will be a blur, coloured simply by the frightful start and the hopeful end. He will not be able to tell you anything of what happened in-between, no matter how many times you ask. The keepers of that secret will be but the forest itself, and they are much less willing to part with what they know. But for now, each step yields a new sensation of pain. Each passing moment is too much to bear; each passing moment is, somehow, borne. Through some grace of God, Stede doesn't fall, which is the only reason he makes it out alive. But his balance is awful, and he frequently slams into trees and undergrowth. He wants to stop, to sit down.
He can't. He has to get to Ed.
When he finally breaks through the trees, it's to the sight of beautiful purple clouds over the sea. Stede frowns. He's never seen a sunrise so vibrant before. And doesn't their agreed-upon dock face the west, not the east?
…Oh. The sun is setting.
They were meant to have met hours ago. Ed must have left already.
He didn't wait. Why would he? You were stupid enough to get kidnapped and then fall asleep.
Stede shakes his head; drags his numb body closer to the dock.
He probably didn't even go looking for you. Probably left as soon as he could. Who would want a lily-livered little rich boy, anyway?
But Stede's not listening anymore, because there, sitting at the end of the dock, is a man with long grey hair.
He wants to call to Ed with everything in him, but… that's a bit uncouth, isn't it? He straightens up as much as he can manage, tightens both arms around his stomach to (hopefully) conceal most of the blood, and steps onto the dock.
Ed's head whips around, his face cycling through several expressions, until he seems to settle on a strange mix of anger and relief. He pulls himself up with an ease that Stede feels a bit jealous of, at this point, and rushes over. "Stede, mate, what the fuck? I've been waiting for fucking hours!"
And Stede would love to reply, he really would, but it's as if his strength had brought him to Ed, and no further; his knees buckle, and this time he lets them. He should know better than to think he would fall, though: even in anger, Ed immediately catches him, brows furrowing as he no doubt encounters the blood soaking through the back of his shirt. "Stede? Stede, what's going on?"
He looks down. Stede's too weak to do the same, but he can see Ed's face pale as he takes it in. The fear in his eyes.
"Oh Christ, oh God, Stede, Stede, what happened? Is that a fucking bullet wound?"
For the first time, it strikes Stede that he's going to die. He chokes on a sob. This isn't… this isn't how it's supposed to go. He only really found Ed last night. They're going to have an entire life together, in — in China, in whatever place they want. He can't leave Ed.
And… and his children, and Mary. He just left them.
He really is a plague.
Ed has shifted him to one arm, cradling him close, the other helplessly trying to cover Stede's wound. "—ede! Stede! Stede!"
Stede blinks his eyes open. He can almost imagine that the sun has come out, blazing and golden on this last moment. It takes all the strength he has left, but he raises his free hand to Ed's cheek, a mirror to their position when they kissed. He wishes Ed would kiss him now.
"I have… so many regrets," he tells him. New pain flashes across Ed's face. He's crying. Stede doesn't want him to cry. "Mary. The… the children. Please…"
"I've got you," Ed says, and holds him closer. "I've got you, I've got you, I've got you."
Stede believes him.
Mary's having another good day in a string of good days. (She should've known it wouldn't last.) She's chatting and having fun with her ladies, the children are keeping themselves occupied, she even has a date with Doug tomorrow night!
And then a man kicks the door down, and her late husband is in his arms.
For a long, drawn-out moment, she thinks it's a corpse. There's enough blood to support that assumption, alright.
"Call a doctor!" says the man carrying Stede.
Ah. So that's that hope snuffed.
Mary drops her teacup.
She sits at the bedside as the doctor finishes his inspection, her head in her hands. Oh, it's not wholly accidental — it has the nice effect of actually making her appear the grieving Not-Quite-Widow Bonnet. But Mary needs a plan, and she needs one fast. After everything he put her through, Stede can't expect to waltz back into her life with nothing to show for it except a dubious friend and a gunshot wound! She won't let him.
Mary lifts her head as the doctor explains his findings — a bullet wound — and his prescription — more leeches — but she's only listening with half an ear. Because it has dawned on her that Stede does not have a good chance of surviving this. Stede has even less of a chance if his (former) wife is left alone in a room with him.
Quite obligingly, the doctor is packing up his kit and making to leave. Mary makes sure to pay him handsomely for his discretion. And if she happens to slip a scalpel from among his tools, well… it's not like he'll be needing it, surely.
And then only the quiet creep towards the bed remains. Somehow, she's irrationally afraid that she'll wake him. The angle isn't good, given that Stede is lying on his back, but she'll manage. She always does.
"What are you doing," says Stede's friend, and his voice contains only death.
Mary straightens, tucking the scalpel behind her in an altogether unsubtle move. She didn't hear him come in. Even though the door was closed. Even though its hinges are infamously squeaky.
She's still trying to decide on a good answer when he simply steps forward and seizes the scalpel from her, throwing it to one side. Which is fair, honestly, although she thought pirates were more the betraying type than befriending type. Hey, for all she knew, she could've been doing this guy a favour!
"The jilted wife killing her husband is a bit overdone at this point, don't you think," the man remarks. It would be amazing, the way he flattens his questions into statements, if it weren't so annoying.
"I don't know what he's told you," she replies, just out of principle, "but he was the one who left."
"And that's a killing offence, then?" Ah, and there she thought she would never hear him ask a real question!
"Only if he's stupid enough to return."
"You should have some respect," says the man, looking her right in the eyes, and Mary realises abruptly that it's the first time he's done so since entering the room. He'd been looking at Stede, before that. His eyes are dark and flinty. There's some strange dichotomy in his face: the sharpness of his eyes, the softness of his mouth. The man nods to the bandage now wrapped around Stede's stomach. "He got that returning to you, you know."
God. Mary can't even begin to imagine that. "Really?" More scepticism creeps into her voice than intended, but this is Stede, the man who wouldn't meet her eyes once in all the time they were married. Not even after they had two children!
And she seems to have struck gold: the man hesitates, eyes going down, and his mouth twists in a surprisingly expressive frown. "I wasn't there for that part," he murmurs. "But it was his dying wish to return to you, to his family."
Rage flares abruptly. Oh, Stede wants to return, Stede wants to make amends, Stede wants to feel absolved from his own sins. And that's her responsibility, is it? Mary doesn't care who this man is and how dangerous his eyes are. She leans right into his face and takes great pleasure in spitting, "The only good thing Stede Bonnet did for this family is die, and he couldn't even do that right."
There's a knife at her throat. Mary doesn't quite know it got there, but she can smell the metal tang of it, feel the danger as a barely-there pressure when she swallows.
"Get. Out," says the man — the pirate, there's no other possibility — quietly. This close, his eyes are more brown than black, and all the more dangerous for it. At a distance, she could pretend he was a monster, a being wholly without remorse. Now she can see how human he is. How he simply does not care that he holds her life in his hands, that a simple twitch could end it forever. Somehow, that's worse.
Mary would love to one-up the man, to laugh in his face, to show how completely unafraid she is, but. There's a knife to her throat.
She gets out.
She doesn't return until the next day, and even then, she can't scrape up the nerve to do more than hover at the door.
She'd had a good long talk with Doug about the situation, and he'd been quite horrified at the whole "trying-to-murder-her-husband" bit. Looking back, Mary felt ashamed, too. She didn't really want Stede dead. She just wanted him… not here.
For now, though, he's lying in her — their — her guest room, getting blood on the sheets. The door's really only open a crack, but if she puts her eye to it, she can see the scene quite clearly. And the scene consists of said husband, as well as the man. He's — Mary, blinks, looks again — he's holding Stede's hand. She tries to reconcile the quiet danger from yesterday with the gentle face he wears now. Can't quite manage it.
Stede, when she turns her attention to him, seems a bit better. He's responsive, at least, although he's frowning up a storm, occasionally jerking where he lies. The man holds his hand through it, not looking away from him.
"Ed — Edward," says Stede, brow scrunching up.
"Shhhhhh," the man soothes him. "I'm here. I'm here."
Stede's face relaxes again, and although he doesn't seem to wake up, his face angles towards the man's — Edward's? You'd think a whole column of sunlight was shining on Stede's face, the way Edward stares at him. A thirsty man seeing water. A drowning man seeing land.
Mary can't bear to watch any more of it. The chances of a man like this Edward missing her presence at the door is miniscule in any case, but there's some part of her that wants to rub it in that this is her house, and that she knows every creak and groan forwards, backwards, and sideways, too, thank you very much. And so it is that she opens the door in complete stillness, closing it the same way, before she asks, "How is he?"
Edward shouts, dropping Stede's hand, and whirls around with yesterday's knife in his hand. He only calms down when he sees her, returning the knife to its sheathe with an annoyed grumble. "Jesus fuck, warn a man, why don't you?" He turns his back on her, sitting back down next to Stede. Mary would feel flattered at the trust involved in the motion, if she thought it was trust at all. As it stands, she's pretty sure it's to show her how little of a threat he considers her.
She makes her way to the other side of the bed, but she doesn't get far before Edward's glare stops her in her tracks. She raises her hands, showing that there's nothing in them — this time, anyway — before repeating, "How is he?"
"Not dead, sorry for the disappointment," he says, darkly. Anything soft has been wiped from his face.
Alright, she deserves that one. Mary takes a seat, further away from the bed than Edward is, still keeping her hands in plain sight. "Listen, I don't really want to kill him."
"Sure looked that way."
"That was a moment of weakness," Mary concedes. Edward snorts, and her temper flares. Remembering the disaster that resulted from it last time, she manages to rein it in, but not before, "And I'm sure you've never hurt someone for selfish reasons," manages to escape.
Edward is quiet for a long moment. Then he barks a laugh, awarding her the point. "You're not wrong, Widow Bonnet."
Now, with the not-dead Stede so close by, the title just feels wrong. Mary grimaces, keeping her eyes on her husband's face. "I really don't want him dead. There's the children, for one. And…" She can't think of anything else. They certainly weren't lovers, barely friends; even acquaintances feels like a stretch. What a sad thing, that their children are the only intersection of her life with Stede's.
"Nothing from your side?" Edward asks, but he seems more curious than anything.
"Have you ever been in an arranged marriage?" He shakes his head. Mary huffs an unamused laugh. "It's… nothing. No love, no soul, just obligations and expectations. Trust me when I say neither Stede nor I were happy."
"I've heard other things about arranged marriages," says Edward. "Love can grow in the most unlikely of places, and all that."
"You think I don't know that?" Mary asks, circling back to frustrated. It's not even at him, not really, but at the accumulation of years and years of whispers: You should just try harder. He would love you if you were different, if you were prettier. It's your fault. She banishes the thoughts with the shake of her head. She refuses to take them onto her own shoulders. "Yes, good arranged marriages can exist, but this was ours. And Lord knows I tried, but Stede just… didn't. I never knew why."
And then, to her great shame, she starts to cry. In front of the man that threatened her not even a day ago! But she just can't stop, because suddenly she's back to the young girl, staring at a lighthouse with hope in her heart. She didn't expect love, not really — she wasn't that naïve — but she'd expected something like companionship, at least.
"Hey hey hey," says Edward, sounding faintly panicked. He doesn't quite seem to know what to do with her tears, but at least he doesn't try to approach her. Mary has always hated people's insistence to get right in the face of anyone crying. "Listen, I get what you're saying, but for some people it just doesn't work that way. And that's… that's neither of your faults, really. Just circumstance."
Mary thinks she gets it, honestly. Heaven knows she enjoys a beautiful woman, but she likes men just as well. And she knows for other people, it's different: one or the other, or neither, or something else completely. There's a small, self-centred part of her that's at least glad to hear it's not her that Stede can't bring himself to love, but her entire gender.
She recomposes herself with all the grace of a high-society lady, and asks, "So what is your name, then?"
"Jeff," says Edward, immediately.
Mary frowns at him. "I heard Stede call you Edward."
Edward looks jumpy. "Fucking Christ, you were around for that?" And then, very unconvincingly, "He was talking to someone else."
"You responded to him."
"Oh, I was lying. Part of the pirate gig."
"So you are a pirate, then."
"What is this, a fucking interrogation?" Edward looks a little wild around the eyes. Mary takes pity on him.
"Alright, Edward, I won't ask any more questions."
"Edward's not my name," Edward says staunchly.
"Sure," Mary replies. "You're welcome to call me Mary."
And then she leaves, before he manages to wipe the gobsmacked expression from his face.
She avoids the room for the next few days. Oh, she can pretend all she wants that it's to give them space, but the truth is that she wants space, too. The sight of Edward is still enough to bring back the rubbed-raw feeling of baring her emotions, although she's starting to feel a bit better. It's led to a lot of constructive conversations with Doug, anyway, and she's once again reminded that she has the best boyfriend.
Edward doesn't make himself hard to avoid, either. He takes his meals next to Stede and, despite Mary's offers, doesn't leave the room even to sleep. Mary hasn't gone spying again, but if she had to guess, he's spending every waking moment holding Stede's hand.
Not just the waking moments either, she sees when at last she ventures into the room. Edward is dozing, folded over his own lap to rest his shoulders and head on the edge of the bed, and still there's a hand on Stede's.
Mary takes a seat opposite him, closer to Stede than she would be if Edward was awake. She can't help but think about everything he said. She'd always thought of her marriage in stark black-and-white. Stede's fault. Her fault. (More Stede's than hers.) To be given a third option, to not place blame at all…
It was a relief.
She's so deep in thought that it takes her a moment to realise Stede's eyes have blinked open. He looks awful, bruised around the eyes as if he's done the very opposite of sleeping for the last few days. He stares up at the ceiling for a long, confused minute, before he turns to her and blinks. "What — Mary?"
"How are you feeling?" Mary asks, letting her tone go brisk and business-like, not allowing any other emotion to filter through.
"Like I got shot." His voice is hoarse, and Mary steps to the desk to pour him some of the water that Edward's been using. She has to help him drink — he's too weak to hold the glass — but she feels none of the expected annoyance. Stede himself doesn't kick up a fuss, drinking gratefully until the water's finished, and then he leans back, closing his eyes helplessly. "Thank you."
"More?"
Stede shakes his head, keeping his eyes closed. It's only when she sits back down that he turns his head to her, cracking his eyes open slightly. "How'd… how'd I get here?"
He really was out of it. Mary didn't think he'd even noticed Edward on his bed yet, even though their hands were still intertwined. She nodded towards the edge of the bed. "Edward brought you. You're lucky to have survived."
Stede looks down, and the look on his face… The vague worry that Mary felt about Edward's love being unrequited (she's starting to get invested, okay, so sue her) is completely dashed. Thank God. The last thing she wants is a pining pirate in her house. And then Stede lowers his free hand slowly to Edward's head, only to freeze when Edward seems to wake. When he settles down again, still asleep, Stede sighs quietly and starts gently stroking his hair. So she has two pining pirates in her house, instead. Jesus fucking Christ.
She's abruptly tired of stewing. Her entire marriage has been a stew, one left on the fire too long. The meat has gone stringy and tough. The bits at the bottom are burning. Mary reckons it's time to douse the fire. "I have a boyfriend. Also, I tried to kill you when you first got here. With a scalpel."
The hand in Edward's hair goes still. Stede blinks at her. "You — what? Wait, you tried to kill me? And why a scalpel?"
"You were really close to dying!" Mary says. "And the doctor had just been there, it was a crime of opportunity!"
"Yes, but why not — why not a gun, or refusing me medical service?"
"That's too obvious, everyone would've heard a gun going off. It would've scared the children. And… it seemed a bit insensitive, given your wound." Mary thinks for a bit. "You're right about the medical service part, that was dumb of me."
"Well, please don't kill me anymore," Stede says, and that's that. Amazing. If it was anyone but Stede, Mary knows this would be far from the last of it, but with Stede, she's pretty sure he's done. "What was that you said about a boyfriend?"
He sounds a bit hurt. He's lying there, holding another man's hand and stroking his hair, and he sounds hurt. Mary stares at him, stares at Edward; repeats the cycle. After several iterations of this, Stede finally catches on, looking down at his own actions and abruptly reddening. It's probably a good sign, honestly, given the amount of blood he's lost in the last while.
"Point taken," says Stede guiltily, but pointedly doesn't take his own hands off Edward. Softly, he asks, "What's he like, your boyfriend? Really, though."
"Oh," says Mary. She didn't quite expect him to ask, and she's suddenly not even sure what to say. "He's… he's just wonderful. His name is Doug, he's my painting instructor, and he's taught me so much." About painting and about love, although she's not going to say that. "He's so kind and he has such a big heart… He and the children adore each other, and I-I just love spending time with him. I don't know much, Stede, but I know that I love him, that I'm in love with him."
There are tears in Stede's eyes, but she's pretty sure it's not for their own failed marriage. He reaches a shaking hand out to her, and she catches it before it can drop. "I'm glad you have someone. You deserve it," he tells her, squeezing her hand gently. "I… I hope I didn't mess anything up, coming back here."
Mary wouldn't have the heart to tell him even if he did, looking as pathetic as he does. Luckily, she can say with complete honesty, "No, Doug's a very understanding guy. He was actually quite upset that I tried to kill you."
"Sounds nice," Stede says, and she can tell he's slipping away again. "Like to… like to meet him."
"Of course," Mary assures him. She's already met Edward, although she hasn't been recovering from near-death in the past few days, to be fair to Stede. But she refuses to be the only awkward one in this strange little square they have going on. Stede will get his chance.
"Can you…" His voice trails away, eyes closing, but he squeezes weakly at her hand.
Mary takes an educated guess at his meaning and puts the hand back where it was, in Edward's hair. Stede's smile, when she looks back at him, confirms it.
She stands there for a moment longer, taking in the scene with an aching heart, before leaving. She can't bear the thought of Edward waking up now and the heartbreak in his eyes if she tells him that he missed Stede by moments.
Stede keeps getting better, staying awake for longer and longer each time. He even manages to intersect it with Edward's waking hours, most of the time. Mary's grateful; she wasn't sure how much longer she could stomach the star-crossed lovers routine.
Finally Stede heals enough to get out of the bed and join them at the dinner table, and of course Edward is there with him. They even enter the room together, but Mary can't judge them for that because Stede's still too weak to walk under his own power.
What she can (and does) judge them for is the faces. They don't look away from each other at all, both sporting the hugest heart-eyes she's seen in her life. Edward is saying something that sounds suspiciously like, "At least we didn't swap clothes this time," and Stede is giggling. Giggling! He looks delighted, and soppy, and…
Happy. Really, truly happy.
She didn't want the children exposed to the horrors of Stede's sickbed, but that means Alma and Louis take off running as soon as they see their father.
"Hello, Alma, hello, Louis," says Stede, smiling tenderly at them. "Don't you look fine!"
"You're not covered in blood anymore," Alma remarks. Dear Lord, she must have sneaked into Stede's room at least once, then. Morbid little child. She must get it from Stede, of course. Mary adores her.
Stede inspects himself thoroughly, before looking back at her with a comically perplexed expression. "And so I'm not! I wonder how that could have happened…"
"Magic," she replies seriously, and Stede matches the expression to nod back at her.
"My word, Alma, I think you've solved it. Do you think that's what healed me, too?"
"No," Alma says. "I think that was the doctor."
Louis, who had been silent and staring at Stede the entire time, runs forward and hugs him around the middle. Mary can't help but startle forward — she sees Edward do the same — but, though he winces slightly, Stede happily accepts the hug. "I'm glad you're not dead," Louis says, craning his head upwards.
Stede looks abruptly close to tears. "So am I, my dear boy. So am I." And then he turns and smiles at Edward.
Of course, that only draws the children's attention like sharks to blood. "Who are you?" Alma asks him.
"Don't be rude to our guest," Mary says, gesturing them back to the table. "Sit down, Stede, before you fall over." She finally takes pity on Stede's panicked expression and tells the children, "This is Edward. He's a pirate, like your father."
She's not taking responsibility for defining what they are to each other, thank you very much. Stede can struggle with that part himself.
"Are you a good pirate?" Alma asks Edward sceptically.
"Not as good as your father," he replies, with a little sideways wink at the man in question, "but I get by. I even have a special name in the pirate circles. Do you want to know what it is?"
"No," says Alma.
"Yes," says Louis.
"Ed," says Stede, looking concerned.
"Alright, only Louis gets to hear it, then," Edward says, leaning over as if to whisper into Louis' ear. Louis giggles and Alma starts throwing up a fuss about being left out. Edward's face is shining from the force of his grin. "Fine, fine, Miss Bonnet, you may also hear! Now, you surely know of the legendary Blackbeard? I'm a lot like him, but as you can see, my name is instead — Nobeard!"
It's not the best joke, but Mary laughs along anyway. The idea that this barefaced man, who looks at Stede with stars in his eyes, could ever be in the same league as Blackbeard!
Stede's the only one not laughing, looking down at his plate with an inscrutable expression. Edward, involved in a lively discussion with Alma and Louis, doesn't seem to notice. Mary does. She thinks, somewhat bitterly, that even an unhappy marriage doesn't seem to stop you from knowing someone too well.
She keeps an eye on Stede for the rest of the dinner, even when he seems to shake off the gloom and starts engaging with the conversation. At some point the children are sent to bed, Mary promising to check in with them for their goodnight kiss before they go to sleep, at which point the atmosphere gets a little more tense.
"Where's Doug, then?" Stede asks. "I thought I was finally going to meet him."
"I thought it was a little too soon," Mary says; can't quite help the way her eyes flick to Edward. Stede winces. "Don't worry, you'll meet him soon enough."
"Who the fuck is Doug?" Edward asks, then startles back at the twin glares they give him. "It was difficult enough to keep it down in front of the kids, okay, you guys are adults!"
"I'd thank you not to swear in front of my children, Edward," Mary tells him, frostily polite. She frowns down at her plate. "Doug is my boyfriend."
Edward chokes on his wine. "Wh— The nobility does that?"
"No, but Stede and I seem to," Mary replies, shrugging. Turning to Stede, she says, "Oh, and you're welcome to tell Alma and Louis about the two of you; they already know about Doug, so it's not as if the situation is unprecedented."
Stede and Edward are carefully not looking at each other. "Mary," Stede says, quiet and strained. "Could we talk? In private?" He's doing something strange with his face, like he's trying to shoot an apologetic look to Edward without actually turning towards him or looking at him at all. It's not really working.
Because she has some social graces (not a lot; in hindsight the Widow Bonnet thing was a little shabby, but no one's perfect), Mary agrees and leads him to their old room. Her room, now. No longer is the sight of the bed a source of resentment and resignation, but one of freedom and joy.
When Stede looks at the bed and then quickly away, she knows that the same doesn't hold for him.
Not yet.
"Somehow, I… I never thought I would be back here," he admits, still looking away from the bed and, by extension, her.
"If I'm honest, I hoped you wouldn't," she says, folding her hands primly in her lap. He turns to her, gaping. "What? I already told you I tried to kill you, this is a lot tamer."
When she pats the spot next to her, Stede only hesitates slightly before sitting down.
"Why did you come back, Stede?" she asks.
For a moment, there's only the sounds of their breaths and the house creaking.
"I shouldn't have left in the first place," he says, very quietly.
Mary doesn't say anything, just takes his hand in hers. That she's held his hand more in the last few days than throughout their entire marriage!
Eventually, Stede continues, "I had responsibilities here. Obligations I couldn't just cast aside. It was selfish of me to leave. And the way I left… I took the coward's way out. I'm so terribly sorry, Mary."
She gives him a few seconds of grace, in case he wants to say anything else, but Stede stares downwards and inwards in contemplative silence. Mary says, quite pragmatically, "That's complete and utter nonsense."
"What?"
"Stede, you weren't the only one unhappy in this marriage. But now I'm happy! And I think you are, too. We both needed you to leave to find that happiness. And we both deserve happiness in our lives."
Stede is crying. So is she. "Do we?" he asks, and she hears, Do I?
"Yes, we do." And she can do nothing but cling to his hand, crying next to him on their marriage bed.
When all their tears are finally spent, Stede asks, "What's it like, to be in love?"
At first she doesn't know what to say. What is it like, to be in love? But it seems that, since Stede first asked about Doug, her mind has started compiling all the sensations and inane descriptions, which now spill from her lips. She doesn't know if she's making sense — she scarcely even knows what she's saying — but when she turns to Stede, something in his expression tells her that she's saying exactly the right things.
And she's far from blind, so: "You've found that, too. Haven't you?"
"Yes," says Stede. "I have."
There's a thump from close by, as if, outside the room, someone's knees just gave way. Stede smiles. For the first time, when she embraces him, he returns it.
"Go to him," Mary tells him.
Stede goes.
Ed can't bring himself to stay, to eavesdrop any further, when what he's already heard is bad enough.
He turns away to his one (other) true love: the sea.
It's there where Stede finds him, on the beach with his arms around his knees, blinking away tears. He can't help but think of finding Stede in a similar position — an event that took place bare days ago, and yet now only lives in his dreams. What they said, what they did, what followed. What didn't.
China. What a laugh.
"I was wondering if I would find you here," Stede says, settling down heavily at his side.
Ed glances at him from the corner of his eye. So bright and beautiful, Stede is.
Why can't we have nice things like this?
We're just not those kind of people. We never will be.
"Did you," he asks, and Stede laughs.
"No, I had a pretty good idea where you would go."
They sit there in silence while Ed scrapes together every last bit of courage he has, until he finally has it in him to lower his arms and face Stede directly. He needs to do this, needs Stede to do this: look him in the eye when he leaves. Ed cannot be another Mary, left without a word or a warning. She might have handled it well, but Ed is completely gone on Stede; he will shatter from that loss.
Stede's eyes are so, so sad. He touches Ed's bare cheek and says, "I'm sorry."
At first, Ed thinks it's an apology for his impending departure, but then he remembers his dumb joke at dinner. "Ah, mate, it's fine." He hesitates. "Do you… not like it?"
"What?" Stede's frowning. "No, I… Is this about my reaction, back at the academy? Because I was just surprised. I like your face, beard or no beard. I just feel like I've — like I've ruined you."
Ruined you. That doesn't feel like something Stede would say. Maybe it's insignificant, but… "Where'd you get that from?" Ed asks.
Stede sighs. "Badminton."
"What? When?"
"That night," says Stede, with no further elaboration. Not that he needs to; Ed knows exactly what night he means. "Just before he shot me —"
"He shot you?" Ed demands. He can't stop thinking about seeing Stede on the dock, about all the blood, about how close he'd come to losing him. How, if he'd given up hope just a few minutes sooner, he would have. "Where is that fucker — I'll murder him —"
"Too late for that," Stede replies, gentle smile at odds with broken eyes. It brings Ed up short like nothing else could.
"You murdered him?"
"As good as." Stede shakes his head slowly. "Just an accident. Just an accident. Like murdering his twin brother. Like abandoning my own family without a word." He lays his hand more solidly against Ed's cheek, and simultaneously turns his head, like he can't even look at him. "Like taking Blackbeard from you."
For a long moment, Ed can't speak through rage. At Badminton, sure, of course, but also at Stede for swallowing this bullshit whole. "So you're saying that, as I am now, I'm ruined."
"No!" says Stede, panicked. "No, no, no. Ed, you're… you're perfect, truly."
Ed's dumb heart flutters at that, damn it all to hell. But he has a reputation to keep up, so he continues ruthlessly, "Then, if I'm not ruined, how could you have ruined me?"
Stede is quiet. "I suppose not," is what he finally says. "But you've changed, since I met you. I don't want you to change for me."
"That's not something you get to decide!" Ed feels suddenly filled with a frenetic energy. He wants to get up, pace around a little, until he can feel more settled in his skin, but Stede's hand is still on his face and he can't bear to lose that. "People change, mate. That's something I knew would happen when I met you — or, or was pretty sure would, anyway. Besides…" He covers Stede's hand with his own, prompting Stede to finally look him in the eyes. "I like who I've become around you."
Stede's smile is fragile, but there. "I like who I've become around you, too." He goes back to looking nervous. "There was something else I realised — Which was a bit obvious, in hindsight, embarrassingly so… But, anyway, I'm sorry it took me so long…"
"Yes?"
He takes a deep breath. Releases it slowly. "Ed, I love you," Stede says, and it cuts through to his heart like the beam of a lighthouse through the dark. This time, it's Stede leaning in, slow enough that Ed can put a stop to it whenever he wishes.
He doesn't.
In all the hours at Stede's bedside, replaying that first kiss, Ed had come to the conclusion that he was looking back with rose-tinted glasses. It had been awkward, as all first kisses inevitably are, and the angle was godawful. Of course it was simply wishful thinking. There was no way it was actually that good.
This kiss is actually that good.
Oh, it's still plenty awkward — for all that Stede initiated it, he doesn't quite seem to know what to do with himself next — but Stede's a warm line along his front, and Ed just can't get enough of him. Then Stede sweeps his hands up and into Ed's hair, and the kiss gets really good. It gets to the point where Ed has to pull away just to catch his breath against Stede's soft cheek. He can feel Stede smiling.
"Stede," Ed murmurs, and Stede gasps. "I…"
"You don't need to say it back," Stede assures him, so gentle. "As long as I can say it to you."
"Say it again."
"I love you," Stede tells him. "I love you, I love you, I love you." Even when Ed goes back to kissing him, he whispers it in-between. Ed feels as luminous as the fucking moon.
Later on, there will be one last fuckery to restore Mary's widowhood. It will involve a rumoured pirate assassin passing through town, an escaped circus elephant, and one doctor's entire supply of leeches. It will involve tearful goodbyes between a healing family, and promises to visit, and even more promises to write.
It will not involve Ed and Stede separating. Not for a single moment.
But here and now, Ed takes Stede's face in his hands and says, "I love you, too."
Afterword
End Notes
and then they get back to the ship to find that izzy has long since been thrown overboard and that oluwande and jim have stolen their spots as the queer co-captains, and then the 4 of them set up a rotation so that they can each have time off for dates and nothing bad happens, ever
i just want to be clear that in terms of a fix-it, this is very much a circumstance change rather than a character change. much as i hate that he did it, i don't think a stede in his right mind would still go to ed after being told everything he's feared by badminton. so obviously the solution is to have him NOT in his right mind, where his need to get to ed is greater than any issues badminton's dredged up! you're welcome, stede
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