Parlait

The day had started out with so much hope. Elizabeth had been disappointed to learn that the Captain still would not be joining her at night to sleep though. He’d stopped by the cabin after his late shift to tell her so, but kissed her goodnight, and again promised that she’d hear from him. And she had, but not in the way she’d hoped. When Dr. Blood woke her for breakfast the next morning, she sat up dreading more milk toast, only to find that a plate of hash awaited her, along with a small bowl of stewed dried apricots, currants, raisins and apples. The hash aboard The Reproach was never much to speak of, but it was such a welcomed change! And the stewed fruits, a valued commodity aboard ship, and at the first taste she detected a splash of the Captain’s own wine, and she smiled, knowing immediately that Barbossa had seen to it that her menu was changed. Such a man!

But that had been nearly three hours ago. She’d hoped that the Captain would join her for her breakfast, being as how he’d been the one to arrange it for her, but no. Her only companion was again Blood, who sat in the chair across from where she sat in the bed, both of them bent over the Captain’s chessboard, but Elizabeth was much too distracted and fidgety to play a proper game, holding her king between her hands and rolling it back and forth as she gazed out the stained glass cabin windows towards the deck.

Blood lingered over his pawn and his bishop before finally choosing to move the bishop, but when he looked across the board, Elizabeth’s king was soundly clasped between her hands. “I’d have just checked your mate, if it had been upon its prescribed position.” He sighed, she wasn’t even looking, her eyes darting from the window to the door, as if she expected it to open at any moment.

“What, doctor? I’m sorry, is it my move?” She glanced at Blood, gave the board a brief sweep of her eyes, but then her attention immediately went back to the windows. Damned rippled stained glass, she couldn’t see a damned thing or person through it, just shapes. But was one of those shapes the Captain’s?

Blood laughed. “Check mate generally means the game is at an end, but go ahead, make a move if you wish, Madame.”

“You always call me ‘madame,’” she sighed, seeing a figure move passed the window, and her breath caught excitedly in her throat, but as the man drew closer to the glass she could see he was not as tall or as broad shouldered as the Captain. Her heart sank, for the hundredth time that morning as she stared at the windows. “I’m not married, you know.” Barbossa was planning on coming to her again, wasn’t he? He didn’t expect her to wait all day for him, anxious? How she wished she had some way to guarantee he’d be with her. “I wish I were, but I’m not.”

“You wish you were?” He hadn’t meant to repeat it, but he couldn’t help it, though he knew there was no getting Elizabeth away from the Captain. “Forgive me for saying so,” he knew his question would anger her, but it would be worth it just to have her attentions for a moment. “But isn’t our illustrious Captain a bit old for you to consider him as husband material?”

Another figure passed by the glass, and even though none of them had turned out to be the Captain this morning, Elizabeth’s hopes still rose, and fell again with a crash. “Do you think he’ll come to see me today?”

She never looked at him, and there was a conspicuous lack of anger in her tone and manners, she hadn’t heard him either. But, Blood smirked, rather enjoying putting her through this and wondering what he could get away with. “Can’t say, one who wishes she were ‘Madame.’ When the Captain and I spoke this morning, he made no mentions of visiting with any woman more than half his presumed age, with whom he could not pursue some type of debauchery.” That should have had her howling and scowling, but nothing.

She folded her arms over her chest as she looked towards the door, some irritation apparent, but not with Blood’s comment. “Is this how you would woo a lady?” Elizabeth asked, without looking at him. “Leave her sitting and waiting on you for hours on end with no promise as to if you’ll call upon her at all?”

“Actually,” Blood answered after thinking it over a bit. “That usually is how it’s done, yes.”

“Well,” Elizabeth huffed, having to admit that she’d run off to be with pirates and become one just as her days of being wooed by gentleman would have started, so in truth, she wasn’t sure how this was to go. “This is an incredibly stupid way of accomplishing anything!”

“All morning you’ve been so preoccupied, and that gets your attention finally?” Blood sighed, but smirked still. “It must be awful for you, having to trust that your Captain knows what he’s doing and that he does indeed mean to keep up with this ‘wooing.’” Elizabeth turned her head towards him and scowled, making Blood’s smirk grow. “I’m just admitting that ‘wooing’ is not that prominent on the list of skills when it comes to pirates, Madame.”

“Nor apparently is bedside manner when it comes to certain doctors, doctor!” She snapped at Blood, then sighed heavily and tucked her legs under her, elbows on her knees, and her face buried in her hands. “This is torture! Why doesn’t he come to me?”

Blood smiled again. “Perhaps he’d prefer you to play hard to get?”

“Hard to get?” Elizabeth’s head and voice raised. “I’m locked in this insipid cabin, and you won’t let me so much as get out of bed! How much more hard to get could I be playing?”

“Oh,” Blood tsked at her, wagging his finger as he smirked again. “I don’t believe your heart’s in it.”

“No, I don’t suppose it is!” Elizabeth snapped, seeing how he smirked at her and it only made her angrier. She missed the Captain so very much, had been without his company for so long, and had him back for such a very short time. It wasn’t fair. Why did he not come to her? “I’ve been waiting all morning for the Captain to come to me, for he’s given his word that he will, and yet he hasn’t, and I’ve had all the waiting I can stand!” Her voice was all exasperation, arms flailing around her and face flushed. She took up the bed sheet and balled it up, tossing it angrily across the cabin. “I don’t know why he’s chosen to play this game with me, when he knows how much I want to see him, and I’m quite sure that if I don’t hear from him soon, I’m going to become a raving lunatic!”

Blood only laughed, satisfyingly. “Going to become?” He questioned as he slipped his hand into his pocket. Elizabeth glowered at him, and Blood smirked again, it was time to let her off the hook now, he’d had his fun with her. His hand closed around the folded paper in his pocket. “Oh, I must have forgotten to tell you,” he pulled the parchment into view and offered it to her. “You’ve a letter.”

Elizabeth still sat fuming, glaring at the door now. “A what?” she huffed annoyed. “From whom?”

“Take it,” Blood sighed, pushing it into her hand. “That wisdom is generally gleamed by opening and reading letters.”

Elizabeth was in no mood, but she took the paper from Blood. Why didn’t Barbossa come to her as he’d promised? Would she only get to see him for a few moments at night, and share a brief and chaste kiss with him? Was that ‘wooing?’ The heaviness of the letter in her hand surprised her, distracted her, who could have written her? No other ship had passed them by to drop off any letters, and besides, who knew where she was? And then her fingers moved over it, the wax seal, a bear’s head pressed into it, from the bezel of Barbossa’s ring! She gasped, so amazed and so delighted! The Captain had said she’d hear from him, and this is what he’d meant! A letter! They’re very first written correspondence! She couldn’t have been happier, save for the Captain coming to her now, to sweep her away in his arms and do to her that which her body was not strong enough yet to take. She slid her finger beneath the sealed fold, anxious to see what he’d written to her, and suddenly realized Blood had been toying with her all along!

“You’re a despicable ass, you are!” She leveled at Blood, but she was so happy to have this letter to read that her anger was fast slipping away.

Again Blood smiled, had to admit, he’d only been curious to see if she’d turn against Captain Barbossa in her torment, as if he needed one last confirmation that she truly did love the old pirate. But she hadn’t ever raised her voice against him, only longed more and more for him. Finally, Blood gave up, knew she was all Barbossa’s. “More fool than ass,” he sighed. “But, yes.”

Elizabeth no longer cared what he said, she was opening her letter, her hands trembling, her eyes taking in the beautiful and even slope and cant of the Captain’s penmanship, such a seductively beautiful sway of letters and words that enchanted her eyes and made such promises to her heart. What had he to say to her?

My Most Dear Ms. Swann,

I wish to explain my absence from your side.
Beyond the duties I am bound to as Captain,
I must confess it is my untrustworthiness with
both your current health, and your honor, that
disallow me from being more attentive to you
than I am. Please, forgive me my debilities
and understand that both they, and my undying
yearning for you, speak only of the idolatry and
fondness I bear for you.

I wish to also make you aware of how your
entreaty for…certain merited words to be
spoken from myself to you, continues to be a
stricture I have not yet found strength enough
to best. But know that both my aspiration and
my striving be as genuine and as blazing as is
my heart in its fullness of you.

Be such as it may, I have now found myself
deeply wearied within that which is proposed
to incline my bravery in pursuance of the
language you charge me to offer. Revealed in
such has been the abomination of what other
words I have neglected to state concerning the
affections I do, most indeed, bear for you. With
this, dear Miss, please be of the sound discernment
that I am full of this afterwards consummation:

Of those words, which I struggle to speak,
be assured that I have fallen so,
fallen hard,
in with every part that is you,
that which be dream,
that which be wild,
that which be bewitching be.

Within deep sienna that is your eyes
I can see the words
for which I have no valor yet to say,
but with each glance,
upon each stare,
bright or sullen be,
I feel renewed,
I am made strong,
forever yours,
so guide me.

Those words stay locked
within my heart,
and for now, there they stay,
and so I must of you beseech
for the two of us to pray.
Light the incense,
and burn to ash
some sacrifice to love’s behalf,
that might stay her watch over me,
for only then
might I overcome
the past evil I have done,
and make to you
love’s decree.

But should the sun never rise
on the day I tell you so,
you’ve only ever look in my eyes
to see words my tongue can’t know.

For you are mine,
and have all my heart,
in there I keep you,
every part,
the good, the bad,
the happy , the sad,
the inner child
who pouts and rages,
the woman in all her stages.

I want and take all of you,
murderous passions,
and battle scars,
grace and beauty too.
Perchance by use of your fair form
my mettle strengthened be,
for each perfect breast,
pearls topped by a ruby
and the sacred zone
which sits below,
where pleasures of the world are wove,
I’ll join our ranks
and make my claim,
and hope to hear you
speak my name.

With greatest obeisance, and much devotion,
Capt. H. Barbossa

Elizabeth finished the poem with a gasp and an enchanted smile. The Captain, Captain Hector Barbossa, Captain Blackheart himself, had turned poet, for her! It was astounding that so much romance boiled within him, and even more so the poem itself, the conduct of a courtier, carrying his promise that he loved her, would always love her, though he was still fighting to say the words to her. And the last stanza…it flushed Elizabeth’s cheeks and chest, made her wish to open herself to him, and take him into her, and let him “make his claim” in so many ways. She read the last four lines again, felt a bright and happy ripple course through her, then fell back upon the pillows tittering with gleeful laughter.

“Now,” Sighed Blood, watching her, and curious about what was contained in the letter, had been ever since Captain Barbossa handed it to him and told him to give it to Elizabeth. “If that’s going to make you so rambunctious, I shall have to confiscate it!” He smirked.

“You’ll do no such thing!” Elizabeth exclaimed, and clutched her letter to her chest, but saw that Blood was only toying with her again. Why did he always have to be such an antagonist? She smiled again, eyes falling once again upon favorite words and lines in her letter. “He wrote to me!” She said with shining eyes. She hoped the Captain would visit next, soon, though his letter made no mention of such. Her hopes were as high as ever though. “Now what?”

“Well, Madame,” Blood cocked his head and glanced over the pages in her hands. “I would think that by the blank pieces he’s enclosed, that he expects that you will write him back.”