Jjail

Jack pulled at his new, unnervingly clean clothing: a shirt of some deep
crimson cloth softer than fine linen, black waistcoat bordered with gold thread,
red and black sash and trim black breeches and even unwelcome new boots dyed to
ebony, stiff and chafing and an inch too long in the toe. He tugged dourly at
the heaviness of just-washed elflocks, which as always were taking much longer
to dry than the rest of his hair. Ran a hand over his neatened mustache,
trimmed and re-braided beard, the smoothly shaved skin around both. He looked
rather barbarian-princely, really: an exotic pirate son-in-law for the region's
most powerful figure. Marrying Alondra might not be such a bad career move when
all was said and done, if it earned him royal treatment and an ever-safe harbor
here. Already he was being offered a citywide celebration to welcome him to the
family.

But when would people learn that a hanging was a decidedly inauspicious
way to inaugurate an engagement?

At his side, lovely in shades of rose and gold, Alondra fumed. Right ticked off
at su padre, she was, for cheating her out of actualization of her own
sordid fantasies. She'd been all blazing eyes and raging words when he'd first
gone to her after his release; now this stony silence. The anger of a spoiled
princess, it seemed, denied a coveted toy.


The courtyard was packed. Word of the looming execution had drawn disreputables
to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with honest townsfolk. The death of an assassin
-- an English assassin -- was something everyone could get excited
about.

Jack wriggled uncomfortably inside his clothes. Flexed toes in his big, shiny
boots, missing the worn flexibility of the old. Far, far too clean.

Booming voices of guards parted the crowd. James appeared, wrists in irons,
arms held tightly by the thickset men to either side of him. Despite their
attempts to jostle him, make him look ignobly graceless with dread of his fate,
he managed to keep his head up, though his shoulders sloped with weariness and
the weight of shackles, and his long legs were hobbled to crimped steps by
their fetters. His beaten face was marbled granite. Jack imagined he could see
the rage crashing against the man's chest on the inside, over and over and
over, trying to wear down that stolidity.


He didn't look about much. Only when he glimpsed the dais with its brightly
garbed watchers did his head turn away from the gallows, their way. Jack's way.
And then he stared.

Jack glared back, suddenly angry. It's not my fault you went and convinced
them you're an assassin, he thought. And-- You got your share of
pleasure out of our little prison games, so don't act like I took unfair
advantage. And also, a bit more fervently-- Sod it all, but it's a
terrible thing to let a cocksucker like that go to waste.

What the situation really needed was a William Turner, Jr. But this day sorely
lacked anyone so blindly committed to righteous honor. All it had was a power-greedy
Spaniard, his rebellious and lustful daughter, and one titivated pirate with
wet-dog hair who missed his hat awfully and really truly wanted a little
more time to explore the perversions of a particular commodore.


Really. Truly. He'd had plans. With choreography and everything.

What to do, what to do...

Like most of Jack's especially brilliant notions, the idea came to him
spontaneously, half-formed, depending on too many variables to possibly count
on and yet already captivating him with its elegance. Details would work
themselves out in the doing. It would succeed. And if it didn't, something else
would come up. Something always occasionally mostly sometimes did.

He leaned down to Alondra's ear. Whispered feverishly. The look she turned on
him was sharp, questioning, suspicious.

"Por favor, querida," he murmured, pouring desperation into
the words, his expression as pathetically soft as it would go. "Él me
es...importante."


Her eyes narrowed.

Jack glanced towards James, nearing the scaffold amidst the bustling, jeering
crowd. He dropped the sugary drivel and went for what he knew interested her.
"Él es un gran amante. El mejor. Lo prometo."

A frown. She looked between them, Jack to captive James, her lush lips curving
downward in consideration. "¿Lo amas encerio?"

What was this? A soft spot after all? He tried very hard to sound lovesick.
Probably he sounded more just plain ill, but Alondra didn't strike him as the
sort to know the difference. "Sí. Verdaderamente lo amo."

Without another word, she pulled away from him to speak to her father, her
words too low and hurried for him to even begin to follow.


James ascended to the scaffold with glowering, arrogant dignity. A lousy
prisoner, oh yes. Took it all so very seriously.

An intent look on her face, Alondra turned back to him and took his arm as the
Guv'ner, shooting him an impatient glare, spoke up. His daughter's fiancé
wished a word with the condemned assassin, he told the crowd. Alejandra herself
wanted to tell the fiend who'd sought to murder her father just what hell she
would see him descend to. Kicking a man while he was down, letting a curvy slip
of a girl spit in his eye -- now there was sport to please a
bloodthirsty mob. Less dignified than the English, perhaps, but far more dramatic.

Alondra led the way through the rapidly splitting audience. She strode with
bigger strides than such a tiny figure should be able to achieve, her fine chin
elevated, her bearing as regal as the princess Jack had imagined her. Even
snootier than a certain legitimate governor's daughter he could name.


He was momentarily distracted by thoughts of introducing the girls, bypassing
all inconveniences of language and nationality and lack of prior acquaintance
and somehow tempting them into bed together. The instant image that came to
mind made his eyes go glassy and caused him to stumble over his own feet,
marring the mood of the moment, though he recovered quickly. He could always
blame the boots.

The guards had left the scaffold. Only the hooded hangman -- a Brit
affectation, that -- shared the platform with James now, and he stepped back
with exaggerated respect as Alondra shoved herself in James's face, subjecting
him to an instant and heated litany of abuse that sounded worthy of
note-taking, really, if Jack had only had time and paper.

But James was watching him. Near as they were, that marble façade couldn't
hold; feral desperation filled those maddened eyes.

"God," Jack said, meaningfully, "is on the bottom."


A lip curled. "You've come to rub it in? At the last you're truly a
pirate. How reassuring."

Ringed hands gestured, illustrative. "Old Roger's on top."

"And night is day and the sun's the moon." Quite impatient he was,
for a man whose only pressing engagement was with the noose. "Your
point?"

Jack blew out a breath. Alondra continued her rant, striding about before the
condemned man, gesturing with real theatrical talent. "You are in my

place. Savvy?"

"I already told you I appreciate the irony. If you've nothing useful to
say, Sparrow--"

"Jack."

"--you might as well just leave me to die without the added humiliation of
your gloating."

"It's always such drama with you, James." He took half a step
back as Alondra paced her raging way past him, her words holding the crowd,
holding her father, holding the hangman. "The world's upside down."

Slowly now, distinctly. "That woman there? Why, she's the Guv'ner's
daughter. And you, mate, are the black-hearted gallows bird fixing to
swing." He raised a finger. "For an entirely unfair and unjust reason,
let me add. Bear that in mind."

Eyes narrowing, James flicked a glance from him to the gesticulating Alondra.

Jack smiled satisfaction, gaze going half-lidded. "There's a good
pirate."

And then the man was in motion, fast as he'd named Grey Tam on the attack, the
slightly-too-short chain of his irons whipping 'round Alondra's dusky neck in
the blink of an eye.


Of course, he did somewhat spoil the effect by telling her, in as
sincere a voice as a man had ever uttered to a maid, "I'm so sorry
about this, Miss."

Ah well. At least only he and Alondra (and perhaps the executioner, standing
there with both hands clasped over his cloth-covered mouth in impotent shock)
heard that.

"¡Madre de dios!" Jack flailed in distress, trying to block
the aim of the nearest soldiers. The Guv'ner appeared disgustingly certain of
his authority, anyway; his minions here were lightly armed next to Port Royal's
contingent. "¡Alondra, mi amor!"


She let loose a torrent of words a proper governor's daughter probably wouldn't
know in any language. James was backing swiftly to the edge of the scaffold,
turning and turning to keep from presenting a motionless target, his face that
of a cornered animal.

The Guv'ner shouted disjointed commands. James and Alondra disappeared over the
edge of the platform, dropping to the ground. Jack hopped down after them with
a flourish.

"...really sorry," James was saying.

"She doesn't speak much English, you realize." A headtilt at the
crowd, stunned and milling. "Nor do they."


"Tell them to move aside. Wait!" He whirled Alondra, facing the
guards who'd ushered him to the noose. "The key!"

"The key?"

"To the irons, you fool."

Jack blinked. Kicked himself, mentally, three dozen times. "The key."


"The key, Jack!"

He issued the demand to the guards. There was hesitation, the sense that they
wanted to look to the Guv'ner, but Jack barked it out with every appearance of
frightened insistence and future-son-in-law-of-their-own-little-tyrant
leaderliness, and abruptly the scrap of iron was shoved into his hands.

"Unlock them!"

"You needn't bark at me. This is my rescue, if you care to
remember."


"Now!"

Resisting an eyeroll, Jack moved to comply: leg-irons first, then hands. He
lowered his voice; for the moment Alondra was contenting herself with bared
teeth and the darkest glower he'd ever seen from a woman (discounting Anamaria,
who was, he'd long ago decided, a shorn Gorgon anyway). "We make for the
harbor." He surreptitiously slipped a dagger from his palm to James's as
he worked at the wrist-cuffs. "You just stole that from me. She must look
to be in imminent danger if you don't want someone to try shooting you on the
way."

James let go a shaky breath as the cuffs were unlocked. Distastefully pressed
the blade to Alondra's throat, his left arm snugly circling her waist. "So
very sorry about this..."


"Digale al idiota que se calle que haga lo que tiene que hacer,"
she hissed.

"What did she say?"

Jack's mouth notched up one-sidedly. "Get on with it already."

James pulled Alondra closer and glared fiercely at the crowd. At that moment,
disheveled, furious and scared and oh-so-very determined, he looked every bit
the criminal bent on escape at any and all cost. Jack couldn't recall when he'd
felt prouder in his life.

"Tell them to move."


Jack told them, loudly, ad-libbing a dire threat to Alondra's well-being. The
assembled scavengers spread like a two-pence whore's thighs on payday. For good
measure he suggested a few dreadful things that might happen if anyone dared
take a shot.

"What did you say?" James was all but carrying the girl along in his
long-strided dash to get out of the square.

"Nothing much."

"Tell me."

"Just try to look like a cannibal." Jack darted in front of James and
prisoner, waving his arms at a dimwitted young soldiery type taking aim. "¡No
le tire! ¡La matará!"


James dashed through an archway leading from the square to the warren of market
shops and carts outside. Hardly anyone had remained here with the prospect of a
hanging to lure them off, and now James moved swiftly, his injuries forgotten.
He'd pay for that later.

He might even be begging for a thorough massage by nightfall...

Jack tripped over his own feet again. Regained balance just in time to save
himself a fall. Bloody boots.

James spun amongst the maze of booths and false alleys, Alondra a scowling,
impatient doll in his arms. Just as Jack was opening his mouth to suggest a
course, James was off again, running, not giving him so much as a glance.

Just who did he think was in charge here?


Jack chased after, eyes constantly roving to mark the disorganized pursuit.
Every so often he shouted a distracting command in broken Spanish to any
fleet-footed hothead who got too close. The ploy wouldn't work for long, once
the Guv'ner got the men in hand again; that mini-despot had been in power too
long and withstood too many enemies to be entirely a fool.

He caught up with James where the festival-day market gave way to more
specialized shops, taverns, that one little whorehouse with unusually clean
girls who hardly ever took it in their heads to hit a fellow unless he asked...
James seemed disoriented; finally he had the good sense to look to Jack,
questioning.

Shouts from behind, too close. Alondra's head jerked around. The knife, Jack
was embarrassed to note, was nowhere near her throat.

Her eyes caught his. "El burdel."

"¿Estás seguro?"


"¡No me discuto!" she snapped. "¿Quien, tú piensas,
está el jefe aquí?"

She would make, he decided then, an unbearably irksome wife. Scowling, he
shoved James in the direction of the brothel.

It turned out Alondra knew of what she spoke: the handful of whores lounging in
the common room seemed more curious than alarmed after the initial shock of
their entrance. Alondra shrugged free of James once inside and rattled off something
swift and harsh to the women -- it went far too fast to be sure, but Jack
thought he caught a gist of, "Say nothing or I'll have you all murdered
very much" -- then led the way in a sprint through the building to another
exit. The stench of kitchen rubbish greeted them from a bin outside the door.

They crept up to the corner of the building. With the initial rush fading James
was feeling his body; his arm cradled ribs in pained protectiveness and his
breathing came shorter, more ragged than the flight alone could account for. He
leaned visibly away from his right leg, flinching rather more than pride should
allow if it wasn't significant.


Jack pitched his voice to an undertone. Let Alondra think he murmured
intimacies. "Will it bear weight?"

James looked at him, panting. Didn't answer.

"It's a fair ways yet to the docks."

Green eyes turned toward the corner of the building, the street beyond.
"Take her and go back. You'll be a hero."

"Ready to try bein' a fugitive on your own already, eh?" Jack arched
a brow. "You're an ambitious one."


More quietly still: "I've hunted pirates for a decade. You think I don't
know the code?"

Alondra, after peering 'round the corner, glanced at them over her shoulder.
Jack edged in closer, voice dropping to bare audibility. "I wouldn't be
reminding me of either of those things right now, were I in your place."

"I'm not going to bargain on your generosity. Don't expect me to stake my
life on whatever whim drives you."

"Are you somehow under the impression that I broke faith with you?"
He understood a little, he supposed, though it angered him nonetheless, and he
spoke coldly for that. "You didn't whore yourself out for nothing. I'd
think that obvious."


Eyes shifted to his. They were hard, tired-mad-scared, not searching. "It
profits you nothing to aid me now."

Jack showed his pricey teeth. "You might notice you're not bouncing on a
line at the moment. Explain that to me, then."

"I can't."

"Sure you can. You're practically walking in me boots already, to hear you
tell it. Go on."

"I can't."


Jack drew back, disapproval heavy on his face, shaking his head solemnly.
"You disappoint me, James. Truly. All I want to do..." He jabbed a
finger towards Alondra. "...is make one girl's dream come true. And
you, with your..." A hand did a furious, eloquent whirl at him.
"...your selfishness..."

"You have got to be joking," James hissed, doing that Looming
thing even on just the one leg. "What sort of imbecile do you take me for,
to think--"


He was interrupted by a slap from a slim, dusky-gold hand. Alondra had moved
like a kite, swooping in, striking, quick and violent and efficient. James's
head bumped the wall. He blinked, startled, working his jaw.

Jack sneered. "See, that's why you have to--"

She slapped him too. Harder, he thought. And glared at them both. "No
más luchando."

Jack rubbed his cheek and glowered.

"Besan y resolven," she commanded, with a regal flick of that
slapping hand.


Jack's finger poked James's chest. "He doesn't care to."

"Do not presume to speak for me. What don't I care to do?"

She crossed her arms. "Besan y resolven -- o yo voy a chillar."

"What did she say?"

A sigh. "She'll scream if you don't kiss me right now."


James looked at Jack. Looked at Alondra.

"Listen, mate, let's just--"

A rough, long-fingered hand caught the back of his head, tugged him forward,
and James kissed him.

Ohhh, did James kiss him.

For safety's sake, Jack grabbed the wall and held on. He grabbed James too,
clutching without thought at the arm pulling him in, recalling that arm and its
brother spanning his hips during the night, the mouth currently sucking his
tongue busy with more urgent business, and the dangerous flicker of green eyes
up at his face, just when...ohh yes, just when...


James shoved him away, breathing hard again, and limped for the junction of
whorehouse and street without looking back.

Good thing Alondra was there in an instant to gnaw on his earlobe and restore
some perspective, rubbing up and down against his side, purring her barely
comprehensible wants into his ear with more fervency than he'd drawn from her
the night they shared a bed.

Jack gave her a good grope, as much for his own comfort as her titillation.
Smacked her rear and followed James.

They made their way through poorly laid out streets, ducking and dodging, James
limping and sweating and Jack tripping and swearing. The pursuit hadn't gotten
any more organized; if anything, less. Focusing on another part of town? But
the Guv'ner was a canny one...he should have had the sense to fan the men out,
radiate and then circle the patrols, control the city's main exits...James
would certainly have done so...

James had the lead when they finally ran right into a pair of soldiers. With no
hostage before him, no shield, he stood exposed in the narrow back street for
what seemed an endlessly long time, though it couldn't have been more than a
few hurriedly pumping heartbeats or else someone would have shot, shouted, done
something...


Jack's instincts, as a pirate who'd been more often outgunned than not,
suggested that he run and duck and rely on Fortuna. James -- ever the Navy man,
ever spurred by the pride and arrogance of a spreading empire -- chose attack.

The soldier tried to spear him with the bayonet rather than firing the musket.
James twisted aside in a whip-like motion, lame leg nearly but not quite giving
out before he lunged diagonally forward. Jack saw the gleam of the dagger he'd
slipped him, silver-bright and then - not.

Then Jack was engaged with the second soldier and had no more time to think.

Hand-to-hand. He hated hand-to-hand. That was the entire point of
stocking his ship with large and aggressive brutes whose mothers hadn't loved
them: one glimpse of their vengeful faces made even the dullest merchant
captains surrender their arms so that it never came to this ungainly weaponless
scramble, this straining-cursing-hating embrace, with no clean kill in sight.

He succeeded in knocking the musket to skitter across the uneven road, but then
the soldier, longer and lankier of build, caught him with a sweeping blow that
he would have seen coming if not for his bandana-lacking hair turning traitor
and blinding him. He swung back around and dove for a tackle, figuring that at
least if he got the man on the ground there'd be less punching. The big boots
intervened -- tripped him up and sent him down. He had the presence of mind to
roll, but the soldier had the clever notion of falling down atop him, wrestling
or...engaging in foreplay or...well, he really had no idea, except that there
was no technique to speak of and he wasn't enjoying it even a little and as
much as he usually appreciated his lithe muscularity he was really wishing
right at the moment that Mum had found some friendly, meaty ogre to sire him...


The man he fought slammed his skull against the street hard enough to show him
the cosmos. He struggled against throttling hands, his thumbs trying to find
purchase to gouge out furious eyes.

And then the soldier went rigid. A slim blade sprouted from the side of his
neck, buried deep. One hand left Jack's throat to clutch there as the man
rolled sideways, back, jarring the knife in its place so the blood poured free.

He died with disbelief just beginning to reshape his mouth.

Jack didn't move except to breathe.

Some unknowable instant later he heard a hoarse cough nearby. Uneven steps,
ragged respiration. "Jack." James's voice. "Are you--"


"Don't move," he said. "Be silent." Then repeated it in
Spanish for Alondra, enunciating carefully.

No one moved. No one spoke. After a few breaths Jack sat up and searched the
narrow street and then, upon considering the way the soldier had been hit, the
nearby rooftops. A man in a brown cloak balanced on the edge of one, crouched
and calm, seeming unreasonably at ease on the perilous tiling of the Spanish
roof.

Seconds ticked toward a minute. The man dropped down, landing neatly and then
straightening to be swallowed by the cloak. His face was thin and severe and
forgettable, his hair straight and brown and dull, and his eyes had the color
and warmth of grave dirt.

Long, measured strides took the cloaked man to Jack's downed soldier. A crouch,
reminiscent of a spider, then a wrench as the oddly shaped blade was retrieved,
cleaned casually on the dead man's shirt and finally taken back within the
cloak like a tooth behind a dog's dropped lip. Grey Tam, maybe, ever-ready to
unman.


He stood again. Swept eyes over Jack, over gape-mouthed Alondra, then settled
his regard on James's bruised face and red-stained hands. He studied the disheveled
officer at length before lips turned in a bare smile -- as if he'd just met the
punchline of an unfunny joke.

Only when the man turned to stroll unhurriedly away, vanishing from sight, did
Jack take another breath. And that was softly done.

"Well," James said, with the composure of one making a monumental
effort to sound unflustered. "There you have it."

Jack stood. "What do I have?"


Musket in hand, James limped to his side. "Proof." Around the
exhaustion and the startlement, the blood and the lumps and the pain, he was
managing to look a bit pleased. Vindicated. "As I said all along, it was a
misunderstanding."

***

[There might be an epilogue. Eventually.]