Silk

Silk - Chapter One

She was bored. Ridiculously so. And therefore she decided she had to find something to do before she did something stupid like trying to engage Jack in conversation again. Or Will, for that matter. Or even Ragetti. She wandered across the deck and down into the hold, down into the very depths of the 'Pearl. At the very back of the ship, in the near-darkness, she saw several chests and crates. Those would do to begin with. She opened the chest closest to her, struggling with the catch that had begun to rust over. It was old then, had been here awhile, had made the journey to the ocean's floor with the 'Pearl when the Kraken took it down. She wondered what it could be, and gasped when she opened the lid and saw the contents. Fabrics, silken and shining. The glitter of jewelry scattered about. Silver plate, gold coins. She moved to the next chest, threw it open and saw much of the same. Why, why did Jack still have all this? Why wouldn't he have sold them long ago? Why did he always seem on the edge of ruin, when the contents of these chests would have had him comfortable for a good while?

She roamed through them at will, pulling out a scarf here, a silver cup there. She sighed in wonder as she opened the last chest and pulled out folds of silk, a shimmering color that alternated between deep rose and gold as she turned it one way and then the other in the lantern-light. She draped it loosely about herself, turning to look in a mirror that had been stowed between two of the chests. She wound it tighter, imagining what a lovely dressing gown it would make, how luxurious it would be. She pulled a rope of huge pearls out of the chest, gleefully wrapping them around her throat and giggling to herself. She moved to dig further into the contents and suddenly a hand shot out of the darkness beside her, grasping her wrist. Of course. She should have known he'd see, and follow her. She turned to look at him. Jack's face was unreadable, but his voice was unmistakably irritated, "What the devil do you think you're doing down here?" he asked her, voice low and dangerous.

She felt like a guilty child and realized she must look like one, "Just exploring, Jack. You surely don't think I'd steal from you?" she demanded.

"You are a pirate," he smirked, just to make her mad. And then suddenly he seemed to focus on how she looked, all silk and pearls. "That would look lovely, wouldn't it." He spun her so that she faced the mirror, standing closely behind her and peering over her shoulder.

Too close, she thought, her breath quickening, "Yes. I thought perhaps a dressing gown," she smiled faintly.

He came even closer, snaking his arm around her waist and pulling her backwards against him, making her gasp, "I was thinking more along the lines of you spread out across it. Naked." He growled in her ear. She started to protest, trying to pull away, but he had spun her about and slanted his mouth across hers.

She couldn't help herself, she was kissing him back for dear life, giving in to every fantasy that had flitted through her mind in the last week. Her hands helplessly let the silk drop. With a curse, he tore himself away from her and caught the fabric in his hands before it fell. "D'you have any idea how valuable this is? And how wet and filthy this floor is?" he glared at her, carefully putting the silk back into the chest. Before she could stop herself, she heard herself saying in a breathy voice quite unlike her own, "As wet and filthy as yourself?"

She'd meant it to be a cutting remark, he was sure, but the way her voice cracked on the last word made him curl his lip, made the comment something far more dangerous. "Filthy, perhaps," he drawled, "But wet would be your position."

She started to protest that she didn't understand what he meant, but then he was kissing her again and the heat between her legs began to grow and she understood all too well what he meant. She felt her knees buckle slightly as he sucked in her lower lip, lightly nipping it as his fingers trailed down her spine. Will had never done this, she thought faintly, gasping against Jack's mouth. Oh, no. Will. She shoved Jack away, backing herself against the hull of the ship, panting. "Don't," she told him when he moved towards her.

He ignored her, coming forward to lean in and brace an arm on either side of her, "Don't? Is this the part where you deny wanting to kiss me? Deny kissing me back just now, deny how fast your heart is beating?"

"Stop," she whispered in protest, knowing it sounded more like encouragement when it was all breathy like that, hating herself for it. "I can't."

His lip curled. "Ah. So sense and propriety return. Disappointing. Thought you were over all those lies. Being a pirate and all." He backed away, turning to go, plucking the silk back out of the chest. "This'll be in my cabin, should you want it," he said. He leaned toward her and she felt herself sway, felt her eyes closing in feverish anticipation. In the next moment, his hands were at her neck and he was untangling the pearls and walking away. Unbearable.

"Damn you, Jack," she hissed at his retreating back, "what do you want from me?" She heard his bootsteps stop. Heard them swiftly returning. He loomed up in front of her, eyes glittering in the lantern light.

"I thought that was obvious," he growled, grabbing her around the waist again and jerking her forward. She couldn't help but moan. "I want you," he hissed in her ear. And then he roughly released her so that she fell back against the hull.

She shuddered a moment, trying to catch her breath, and heard his voice again, "And I'd like you to be making those sounds when I touch you. In my bed. On this silk. And wearing nothing but these pearls." She couldn't suppress the small sound that escaped her throat again, couldn't stop her eyes closing.

He turned to go, noting with satisfaction her pronounced trembling, her flushed skin, and couldn't resist a parting shot, "And I'd like you to make up your cowardly mind and give in to the fact that you want it as well."

He walked away finally, leaving there in the gloom of the hold, trembling and hating herself for being unable to decide what she truly wanted. Her love for Will was one thing. But never in all her days had he ever made her feel even a tenth of what Jack did when he touched her. And so she sat in the darkness, fighting back tears, running her fingers over the lid of the chest she sat on.

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That evening as the sun sank below the horizon, she watched Jack at the wheel of the 'Pearl. To be more accurate, she caught herself watching his hands as he played them over the wood, those long fingers firmly grasping the… "Stop it," she hissed to herself. Jack was studiously ignoring her. Fine, then. Will came up to her, carefully polite as always, so solicitous, "You should go below and eat something, you're looking a bit pale." She studied him a moment, his handsome face so distant these days. She slid her hand into the crook of his elbow and pitched her voice so that Jack could hear, "I'll stay with you awhile, Will. The sunset is lovely." She glanced back, thought she saw Jack frown before he turned away to say something to Gibbs.

Will was taken aback. They hadn't spent much time together of late, the unanswered questions still in his head, still wondering what she really felt about himself, about Jack. "I'd like that," he smiled at her hesitantly and noted how her eyes lit up. So beautiful, his wild Elizabeth. He wondered again if there was still a marriage to be salvaged once they reached Port Royal.

From the wheel, Jack watched them. Coward, he thought as he watched her with Turner. Fool, he then called himself for caring. "Going below, take the wheel," he barked at Gibbs and turned towards his cabin with rum on his mind. But he paused to look back at the two figures walking forward on the deck and he curled his lip up. Maybe he'd wait a bit before going below.

As the sun sank and the sky rapidly darkened, Elizabeth steered Will forward as gently as she could. She was going to give him the chance, going to encourage him to take her and to join with her as a husband would. She was tired of waiting, tired of creating fantasies in her mind that possibly had no basis in reality. Except she could remember the few things Jack had done and implied, and realized her imagination might not be so far off after all. "Will," she said softly, "I'm sorry things have been... strained between us."

He stopped to look down at her, that sweet quizzical look on his face, "I thought... well, I thought you might be having second thoughts about marrying me, now that we're heading back to Port Royal."

She couldn't help it, she took the coward's way out. Instead of answering the question honestly in words, she pulled his head down to hers and kissed him. She heard a startled sound from him, and then his mouth had opened under hers and she tried to lose herself in the feel of him, all mouth and hair and muscles under her hands.

Will let out a surprised moan when she slid her hands down his back, her mouth doing things that surprised him. She was sucking his tongue in, nibbling on his lips, almost as if... as though she were the man and he the maiden. She was taking control and he found it terribly arousing even as his mind began to wonder whether she'd always been this way or if she'd learned it... "Elizabeth..." he breathed, pulling away.

She smiled, and slid her hands down the outside of his thighs and back up, causing him to jerk and lower his mouth back to hers for more. When she took his own hand and pressed it against her crotch, when she whimpered slightly and tried to grind against him, he gasped and pulled away from her, "Elizabeth! Don't."

"Why?” she demanded, breathlessly, "Why can't you touch me? We're to be married, and I... I'm tired of waiting." She was so damn tired of it, in fact, that she was about to rip his clothing off. "I want your fingers on me and in me..."

He groaned softly, trying to step back and away from her, but she followed him, stalking him. "Where did you get these notions from?"

"I have a vivid imagination. And ears to hear the maids talk. And hands to explore with," she told him, voice low in her throat.

His breath caught at the implication, at the picture it presented, "But... You've never been so... Did you...?" He stopped, wondering again if she'd lied about there being nothing between her and Jack. Wondered if she'd picked up this new knowledge recently.

She read his mind, and was suddenly, horribly offended. Being damned for something that she hadn't even done. Typical. "I've been with no one else, Will."

He stammered, feeling guilty for even thinking it, "I wasn't... I didn't mean..." Why the hell did he feel like that foolish blacksmith again, the one that never thought he had a chance with the governor's daughter? When had their roles reverted back to this?

She reached up to his neck, running her fingers down it slowly. "Would you care to find out for yourself? Care to test me and make sure?" She heard his breathing quicken, saw him lean toward her. "Show me you want me," she whispered.

Her hands had reached into his shirt to the skin beneath. He closed his eyes, biting back a groan and found that he'd plunged his hands into her hair and yanked her forward, kissing her fiercely. Her mouth continued to move in ways that staggered him, maddened him. When had she made this wanton shift? When had her kisses bloomed so darkly? She pushed him back slightly until he had his back against the rail, continuing to move her lips and tongue. Something flickered in his mind when she pushed him back, some vague memory of a similar situation, but then her hands slid across his chest again, sliding across nipple, and he moaned softly. He grasped her by the hips, pulling her roughly against him, against the growing hardness in his groin, grinding against her. He heard her gasp, a sound of inarticulate pleading. She snatched up his hand and brought it to the opening of her shirt, arching against him as he reached inside. His fingers brushed over the cloth she'd used to bind herself with and he growled, still rubbing where he thought her nipple might be. "Will," she gasped, and it was the sweetest sound he'd ever heard, "It's dark here... please..." She pulled back briefly to look up at him in the faint twilight, the last of the blue fading from the horizon line.

"We can't," he began, and then groaned as she reached down and brushed her hand over his groin and all rational thought fled.

She saw his head go back as she touched him; his long dark hair had come loose and was hanging down, making her think of... no. And then he threw his head back down towards her, quickly fumbled with the buttons of his breeches, and thrust her hand inside. She hesitatingly brushed her fingers against him. So hot, so hard... but the skin of it so soft. She had always wondered what it would feel like, she only wished it were light enough to actually see it clearly, her first. He bucked against her hand and leaned forward to moan into her hair, "We shouldn't... we can't... ah, God..." He bucked again and she squeezed it gently, experimenting. He suddenly bent and sank his teeth into her neck, his hips pumping harder into her hand. No, this wasn't fair, why was he getting all the pleasure? "Will," she rasped, "touch me..."

"Don't stop, Elizabeth... don't..." he thrust harder, and she wanted to pull her hand away but she was absolutely fascinated at how he was shaking and moaning, and all from her fingers. She realized her entire body felt heavy, her head was spinning, and the place between her legs felt aflame. She reached out with her free hand, grabbing one of his, and thrust it between her legs again, "Will, please... touch me..."

He looked up at her, puzzled, stilling the bucking of his hips. As if he couldn't fathom that she would feel need as he would, couldn't feel the same burning desire. She suddenly realized he didn't understand, that he thought she was being wanton by wanting to receive the same pleasure from him, and she took an involuntary step back. Her next thought was that she was very angry, and very frustrated. "You think I don't want to experience pleasure as well? Or that I shouldn't want to?"

He knit his brows, his beautiful face covered in sweat, his eyes half-closed. "Elizabeth. I can't. We aren't married."

"There are other things you can bloody well do that don't involve me no longer being a virgin," she hissed and saw the shock on his face in the faint light. She thought she heard a muffled sound nearby. Was that a figure in the darkness, watching them? No. He wouldn't... Jack?

"Elizabeth!" Will was insisting, "It isn't proper. I shouldn't have let you do this to me, and I certainly will not be doing anything improper to you before we're truly wed." This was madness.

"Ah," she heard herself drawling, before she even knew it, "Sense and propriety have returned." And she realized where she'd heard that herself, not four hours ago. Damn it. And still, Will seemed utterly at sea, utterly ignorant of what she was feeling.

"I'm sorry if I offended you, Elizabeth," he stammered, "I'm so sorry. I love you. I got carried away and..."

"Did you not think it was because I wanted to? Because I wanted you to carry me away with you? That after all we've been through," she paused and then spat out, "did you think I still only wanted chaste kisses?" She stopped, horrified at herself, and heard his intake of breath. Matched by an intake of breath that sounded vaguely like a chuckle, over in the darkness.

Will had buttoned his breeches, tried to rearrange his shirt into a semblance of decorum. She didn't bother adjusting hers. "Elizabeth, we've spent entirely too much time at sea, entirely too much time living rough lives. We haven't been ourselves. You don't know what you're saying."

That was it, then. "If you think I don't know what I'm saying, then you don't know me at all," she whispered.

There was a pause, and his voice sounded so sad that it nearly broke her heart, "No. I don't think I do anymore."

She couldn't answer that; there was nothing to say. She turned on her heel and walked away down the deck, fighting back tears of frustration, fighting back the loss of him. For she knew now, with certainty, that she would not marry him, that they'd grown terribly and finally distant. And then she heard bootsteps shadowing her down the deck. A curiously light, cat-quick step that did not belong to Will. She broke, then, and ran for the hold, running to find a place to hide before Jack reached her and she had to endure his mocking.

Will watched her go, aware that something dreadful and final had just happened. He'd heard it in her voice. And he felt his eyes burn at the finality of it.

She'd fled into the hold, Jack knew, fled from him. Turner was a damn fool and Jack wondered if the boy realized he'd just lost Elizabeth forever. And then Jack became aware of an almost savage glee surging through him. He'd won. He'd have her, oh yes, and keep her too. On his terms. But not without some friendly torture first; he figured she'd earned a little. So he let her run. He'd catch up.

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She found herself back below, wandering amongst the chests of plunder. Which was foolish, really, it wouldn't be difficult for him to find her here if he wanted to. She sat on one of the chests and wiped the last of the tears from her eyes. She was done with them, forever. Will was not meant for her, nor she for him. They were different people, who now seemed to speak a different language and want different things. She would not be confined, constrained, treated as an afterthought or a prized possession. She wanted the waves and the wind and the snap of canvas. She wanted distant lands and exotic scents and unfamiliar faces. She wanted... did she have the courage for it? The decision had been made, Will was out of it. So did she truly want Jack, knowing that there was no safety or promise there? She could still feel the dampness between her legs from her clumsy attempt at seducing Will. She thought of how merely the whisper of Jack's breath near her could make her feel that way, and she groaned in frustration.

She looked down at the chest she sat on, the one that had contained the silk and pearls. She'd never gotten to ask him why he kept all this, hidden away here like a dirty secret. She realized she was idly rubbing her fingers back and forth over the tops of her thighs and caught her breath. She was still completely aroused. "Oh, bloody hell," she sighed. What was her life to be, now? She'd just ended her relationship with Will, whether he realized it yet or not. She would not marry him. No one else was lining up to marry her. Her father would likely try again, of course, bargaining on her beauty and his position to find her a suitor, even with a ruined reputation from sailing with pirates. She had her father's home, and his money – assuming Beckett hadn't taken all to smash – so she'd have a place to live. So. Would she live a spinster, trapped in "society" and all that went with it? "Oh, God, no," she suddenly, desperately cried out in the darkness. She felt impossibly caged. With Will there had been a sense of some adventure still involved, marrying a blacksmith and a swordsman and a son of a pirate, even if his plan was for them to settle down and live a normal sort of life. If Will was not for her, she didn't know who would be. Norrington had certainly not been either, though it was funny how infinitely more interesting he'd become after she'd found him in Tortuga, and how much of a bastard he'd ended up being in the end. And then there was... her other option wouldn't have her anyway. Well, he'd have her alright, but not to keep. He wasn't the marrying kind, of course. And what kind of life was it for a somewhat nobly born lady to be left behind in port like some sort of doxy, waiting for when she was wanted? Unless...

She sank into a reverie of living on a ship like this, of fighting tide and wind and storm, sailing the world over in search of new treasures, new adventures. And then she shook herself, falling back into despair. Was she really considering that? No. Absolutely not. She'd live with her father, tolerate the suitors he trotted out for her, and maybe even meet one she could tolerate enough to wed. She'd marry, run her own house, take what pleasure she could in silks and teas and dances, teach her own daughter to be a proper damned lady and... "I can't," she wailed aloud, dropping her head into her hands. She was at war, and she wasn't sure which part of her was winning.

It simply wasn't done. She was of good birth. She had been brought up with morals and scruples and manners and hygiene and Christian values and... she absolutely could not gallivant across the sea, being a thief and occasional murderer when the occasion warranted, firing upon others to gain their possessions, never having a home of her own, sleeping rough and living rougher, never attending society events or even being part of society... it was impossible. But then there was the lure of all the places she'd never seen, the languages she'd never heard, the beauty she'd never experienced, the lust she felt when engaged in cannon fire and the spin of the wheel, the scent of the ocean all around her...

So, here it was. Her choice. What to do with herself? She knew the short answer: she'd continue on this voyage back towards Port Royal and see her father and make she he was alright. That was certain. What wasn't certain was what would happen after that. Or what would actually happen on this voyage home. She'd said she was ready to be married. She'd indicated she was ready to experience her physical awakening. How ready? Ready enough to let Jack seduce her? Ready enough to give up that small, so insignicant part of herself that should be saved for a bridegroom? A bridegroom she no longer had, or a future one of whom she no longer cared if he knew of her loss or not? If she was going to end up eventually shackled to a man in wedlock (shackled? lock?), wouldn't it be better to have her pleasure now and not worry about the consequences? 'Better to ask forgiveness than to ask permission' – wasn't that something Jack liked to say? Was it so easy for a man to tell if she wasn't virgin? She was keenly aware of her inadequate education in this topic. And oh, Jack, would be the man to teach her. She already knew that, knew from the way he touched her and kissed her and... the way he set her on fire.

Fine. He would not marry her, that was acknowledged. Why would she want to marry that mess of a man anyway? He was likely happy to drop her off at home and be rid of her. They'd likely not cross paths again after this. So why not let him do it? Why not experience what it was like, ask all the questions she'd been dying to know? She knew he'd answer them thoroughly and shamelessly. One thing about Jack, he'd never mocked her when she asked honest questions.

The life she'd thought she had planned had all fallen away, so there was nothing left but to choose what she wanted now. She had no one to please anymore, no one to worry about whether she hurt them or not. Free. And selfish as she wanted to be. It was a staggeringly heady thought and a pleasant one. I'm sorry, Will. I loved you once. But we're beyond that now.

She got to her feet and made her way upward, gladly embarking on what would be the ruination of her maidenhood and the abandonment of childhood dreams.

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