White and Black Pearls 1 - Seven Pearls

Chapter Eighteen

The head of the Flying Dutchman’s captain shook slowly. That was true, Jack always came back. Still… he couldn’t imagine watching Elizabeth die, even with the knowledge that she would return to him. He couldn’t imagine what Celeste had felt. He could imagine some small amount of what Jack had felt, though; he remembered well his last moments of human life, with Elizabeth weeping, as he tried to say so much but couldn’t utter a single word of comfort for her. He hadn’t known then that he would be resurrected, just as Jack hadn’t known as the maw of the Kraken crushed down upon him. It had been the most terrible feeling in the world.

“You look upset,” Bill mumbled. “Do you want me to stop?”

Will was brought back to reality. “No,” he said urgently. “Don’t stop. I know parts of it from here. We went to Tia Dalma’s to seek shelter and I suppose a place to mourn, but I was too wrapped up in thoughts about Elizabeth loving Jack to even notice the signs or consider that Tia Dalma might be helping us to her own purposes. Barbossa gave no hint that he was planning something more either, though he did seem… different than before. More human is what I want to say. I can’t decide if it was because some amount of somberness was instilled within him from Celeste or he was just that different after no longer being cursed.”

“Maybe both,” Bootstrap nodded. “Maybe neither. But now your question about the stars on Jack’s death is answered. She didn’t weep… maybe because she was comforted knowing that he wasn’t in the locker permanently, maybe because she was too laden with sorrow to even muster the strength to cry. A lot of this is speculation anyhow so your guess is as good as mine.” He finally took another drink. “She came again, on board your ship as you were heading towards World’s End. She came to Barbossa.”

Will was lost in the story again as he listened to his father.


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