Elizabeth sat and listened to her tale with a level of glee that Theo might've begrudged, had she not been so relieved, down to her very bones, that she wasn't racing to the island's authorities and demanding for a stake to be built so that she might be burned at it. Nor a ship bound for Bedlam, for that matter. Not least because it would be a bit of a lengthy journey - and possibly a bit of a wait, depending on whether it had been built yet or not. So Theo told her the truth, and she told her…most of it. Oh, everything she told her was the truth, but she just didn't tell her every single part of that truth, sticking to the apparent time-travel aspect of her appearance and mentioning none of the fictional world part.
The knowledge of what was to come was the only feasible weapon currently housed in her arsenal, and it was too important to go sharing just yet. It didn't matter much, though, because Elizabeth was in such raptures about what she did tell her, that offering even more was hardly necessary.
"When I saw your portraits I could hardly think to believe my eyes," Elizabeth confessed "But then I found the coins…currency, I take it? I've never seen craftsmanship of the like. And the dates engraved thereon. Two thousand and ten? The date you've come to us from, could it be?"
"It's an old coin," she murmured "A decade old. I left the summer of twenty-twenty."
Elizabeth breathed a disbelieving laugh, leaning back in her chair and staring at her with undisguised delight.
"You have to understand, I didn't do this on purpose. I have no idea how I did it, or how it's even possible. I'm not even sure that I won't wake up in ten seconds' time."
"Would my assurances on the matter help?"
"Not until I'm completely certain you're not a figment of my imagination."
"A fair assessment," Elizabeth inclined her head "But on one score you've no reason to worry - I hardly suspected you'd done this on purpose. If not because of the terrible state you were in when I found you, then because of the horror on your face now."
Well, it was something at least. And that understanding was what had Theo keeping her lips sealed against any temptation to ask that she start using smaller words to form shorter sentences, so that Theo could understand her through the high-pitched mechanical whirring going on in her own head as she tried to come to terms with just what the hell was going on.
"So you're not going to tell anybody, then?" she sought reassurance.
Elizabeth cracked a wry smile.
"Theodora, whom would I tell? They'd think me a fool, and you a charlatan. Given that I can happily say that I'm no fool, and that I hope my assessment of you is therefore correct, I can't see what need we have for the opinions of the menfolk," leaning forward then, she rested a delicate hand atop hers "What I propose is a prospect far more intriguing."
Had Theo been in better shape, she might've tried to spit forth a big long eloquent bit of prose in return, just to prove she knew a few three or four syllable words. But she wasn't, and she was too interested in the promise behind Elizabeth's words.
"Which is…?"
"I'm going to help you."
The gleam in Elizabeth's eye suggested that this had the potential to be a great deal more dangerous to her than the response she'd originally feared could be.
Captain James Norrington was fairly certain that Miss Elizabeth Swann would soon be the death of him. Very soon, if she continued on as she had been thus. When a footman from the governor's mansion had raced into Fort Charles, breathless, and told them the nonsensical tale, James had been able to find the praise-worthy within it. The kindness, generosity, and firm moral character it displayed - and, most impressively of all - how it sounded as though Miss Swann had handled it all personally, not content to linger by the side-lines and dole out orders. But then? Then she continued to handle it all so very personally. To a fault.
Guarding her charge as fiercely as a child might do so with a stray pup they'd carted home one day, fearful that the moment they took their eyes off of it would be the moment it was cast back into the street, Miss Swann had thus far refused to allow him any audience at all with her Irish foundling. All James knew was that her name was Theodora Byrne, and that she (by Miss Swann's own reckoning) was in no state for guests, as of present. Which meant that all James could do for the time being was wait, and worry about the sort of person she may have unwittingly carted home through a desire to do good.
It wasn't that he thought Miss Swann was a fool - no, she was far from that, but she (thank God) had no experience with the sort of creatures who prowled these waters. Not truly. Not beyond watching them hang. While she was not a simpleton, experience was the only thing that might show a person just what these creatures were truly capable of - and that they were not capable of less depravity when they were female, nor when they were injured for that matter. Few liked to believe themselves gullible, and fewer still were capable of realising that only a small number of people (if any at all) were capable of instantly recognising lies for what they were the moment they were uttered, regardless of the situation. And he could find no evidence of any recent shipwrecks nearby.
Was Elizabeth likely to be easily fooled? No, he thought not. Generally speaking. But anybody could be fooled under the right circumstances, and he was worried that those which had brought Theodora Byrne, if that was even truly her name, may be just that. Time would undoubtedly tell, but James was hardly content to leave the matter in the hands of time. Still, it left him sailing perilously close to the wind. The more he pushed the matter - within the bounds of politeness - the more Miss Swann swaddled her new charge and refused to let any one near her, instead simply repeating whatever information Miss Byrne had told her in place of a proper interview. Seeing as Miss Byrne had yet to do anything wrong, James could not yet push the matter. For the time being. Once she was fit to leave her bed, however, it would be a different matter.
It was no small relief, though, that Elizabeth seemed to have come to that same conclusion - perhaps at the behest of her father, who could see he was going quite mad with her refusal to cooperate, or likely because (as James had said) she was not a fool. And so, two weeks after her unceremonious arrival on their shores, he was invited to the Governor's mansion to meet their new resident. He exercised some restraint, and chose not to bring officers with him - should an arrest be in order. Mostly because he suspected he'd be turned out without so much as a glimpse at the unknown woman who was thus far proving to be an utter headache.
He heard her before he saw her. Their first indication that the women were indeed on their way was Elizabeth's voice - in the entrance hall, at the top of the stairs, by the sounds of it. It was joined by a second, slightly higher in pitch with a lilting accent, but James could make out no more than the voices, failing to comprehend whatever words sent them into soft peals of laughter until they were, by his hear, almost entirely down the stairs.
The culmination of their slow - glacial - progress came when a servant opened the grand white doors to the drawing room, and the two women stepped into the room. James and the Governor both rose to their feet to greet them.
It was comical. How could it not be? After all of the worry and suspicion she'd prompted in him, for James to finally see her for the first time and be forced to note the entire absence of claws, fangs, or horns as she met his gaze and smiled sheepishly at him.
She was not quite fit for visitors yet, that much was clear not just from how Elizabeth supported her as she walked, but from her appearance alone - and he warred between guilt, and cool relief at the fact that his prodding at least seemed to have had some sort of impact, after all. Had he been lax in his duties, he suspected it would have been another week still before she surfaced. While she had been made decent for company, clad in a thick mint green dressing-jacket and matching slippers, her long crimson hair bound into a thick plait that fell over one shoulder, it was clear to any eye that she was not well enough to dress properly. Beneath the worst of the sunburnt patches on her face (primarily her brow and cheekbones), her face was pale, and a thin sheen covered her face from the exertion of the stairs alone, the stray strands that escaped her braid sticking to her face and neck as she moved. Few, if any, could feign such things, regardless of how skilled they were in the art of pretence.
If he were to finally settle on the idea of her total innocence, he knew with a sinking feeling that he would later feel guilty for demanding this. But should she mean ill, he would never forgive himself. With the costs weighed as such, he knew he had done the right thing. It was with that in mind that he would not allow himself to be put at ease from first impressions alone.
"Captain Norrington, may I introduce Miss Theodora Byrne," Miss Swann offered him a dazzling smile, finally releasing the arm of her charge "Theodora, this is Captain Norrington - he's been very keen to hear of your arrival here."
Once apparently convinced of the hardiness of her own two legs, she offered him another tired smile - and he'd be outright lying if he tried to insist that she was not fair. Factually speaking. Beneath the toll the last few weeks may have taken on her, it was even possible that she was quite striking. In her own way.
"I'm pleased to meet you," she said.
Then, surprising everybody in the room (the servants on the side-lines included, judging by the almost imperceptible glance they shared), she stepped forth and offered her hand for him to shake. Governor Swann gave a cough that did a poor job at disguising a surprised puff of laughter, and Elizabeth? Elizabeth beamed like the strange display was the best thing she'd ever seen. When was the last time he'd seen her smile thus? Certainly never at him, nor at one of the many gatherings high society put on here in an attempt to pass the time at the otherwise fairly quiet port. James liked it not. It suggested a level of influence on Miss Byrne's part - one that he did not trust.
She offered her hand like a man would, rather than with her palm down for him to clasp. It would have been forward in the case of the latter, but the former only stoked his suspicions regarding her background. However…she'd handed him an opportunity. To use incredibly apt phrasing. Before she could second-guess the gesture thanks to the reactions of those in the room, James stepped forward and shook her hand.
The grip she offered was firmer than he expected, but the skin of her hand was smooth, soft, and not roughened. Not in the immediately obvious way that a pirate, or indeed any sailor who spent much of their time toiling with rope, would display. Or one accustomed to days filled with hard labour. There may have been other, less obvious calluses that might reveal some specific trade or another, but he could not ascertain that without further inspection - and that would be entirely inappropriate.
Still, he could already glean that she wasn't from the serving classes. But she hardly had the manner of a lady, either. Already his suspicions rose.
"How do you do?" he greeted - with a tone of civility that he was more or less happy with.
Releasing his hand, she stepped back and slowly sank down onto the settee beside Elizabeth, prompting James and Governor Swann to return to their seats, too. In the short silence that followed, he took the opportunity to cast a glance over the rest of her - within propriety, of course, and found that he could see no scars, nor any signs of a life of hardship. Well, other than the dark tan that her sunburn had begun to fade into. It must have been severe to take this long to heal, he had to concede that much. Although Port Royal's chief physician had confirmed that much to him, likely at the behest of the Swanns to make him stop pressing for a meeting.
"I'm sorry it took me so long to be able to meet you," she said "And for my, er, current state. Stairs are practically Everest to me right now, so there's not much hope for everything else 'til I manage to pull myself together."
James' brow furrowed "...Everest?"
"It's the…" pausing, she glanced around and seemed to realise nobody had the slightest notion of what she was talking about "Never mind. Anyway, I just meant that I don't mean any disrespect by appearing before you like this."
As he listened silently to her words, he had to fight to keep the frown from his face. Not because of the words themselves, but because of how intently Elizabeth watched her new friend as she said them, the slightest hints of a satisfied smile pulling at her lips. As though they'd rehearsed this together. Since when was there a pressing need to rehearse the truth?
When he returned his attention to Miss Byrne, he found her watching him with eyes just a touch widened, watching his reaction to her as keenly as he'd been observing her. To see if he believed her? Or was it possible that he was just making her that nervous within five minutes of meeting him alone? However stern he could be, he doubted it. No, something was at play here, that much he was certain of - but he wouldn't discover what it was through being dour. So James forced a tight-lipped smile onto his face as Elizabeth rang for tea, and made his mind up to be perfectly cordial throughout the entirety of this meeting. Even if she didn't bear the signs of being a roughened pirate, that didn't mean she meant no harm, that she was hiding nothing. If he made her comfortable enough, no doubt she would slip up and reveal those secrets.
And then the Swanns, and all living in Port Royal for that matter, would be safe.
A/N: Nobody knew that Everest was the world's tallest mountain until 1856, and it was named after a man born in 1790, over half a century after the events of this story.
So on the matter of the handshake - from what I can gather, it wasn't really typical for men and women to shake hands in this era, but a lot of that largely depends on the location. It was generally more accepted, at least in later periods, for it to happen in the north of England, in Scotland, etc….as my fellow North and South enjoyers will know. But because Norrington, love him as I do, is painfully southern and proper, at this stage at least, I think he'd find it surprising. But it's not so crazy that it couldn't be attributed to Theo's Irishness. Unless Norrington was determined to be suspicious.
That being said, a lot of what I can find on how appropriate it is or is not is based on later time periods - the Regency era, leading up to the Victorian era. The Georgians were markedly bawdier than that lot, so it mightn't have been a major deal. All of that in mind, I don't think it's insane to have it inducing a raised eyebrow as far as the Noz is concerned. (Listen, a friend who knows about this referred to him as that to me once and now it lives in my mind rent-free and I'm gifting it property in your consciousness, too.)