Chapter Text
Her victory over Beckett in their small battle of dominance was short-lived.
The repairs were taking longer than expected. Ona had been patient at first, grateful she had an opportunity to recuperate. Now, she was growing restless. That wasn’t so unusual, but what was unusual was the loneliness that had seemed to strike her out of nowhere and filled her every thought.
Currently, she was looking up at the stars from the deck of the Pearl, almost a week after their arrival. No one was in sight, the crew taking the advantage of being docked to go out drinking, gambling, and enjoying the intimate company of others.
Ona indulged in no such activities, nor did she socialize with the crew or captain. She was isolated, utterly and completely. Alone, even on a ship filled with pirates. She knew barely any of them, and felt that even though they were polite to her, they would run in horror if they truly knew her story.
The Dutchman had still not returned. Not that that was a contributing factor to her loneliness, she told herself. No, if anything, she was feeling this way because a steadfast, constant part of her life had been ripped away only a few days ago.
Jones was dead. Finally dead. And Franklin has been avenged. But it did not satisfy her desire for vengeance. It did not raise the Mariner and restore Franklin to life. And it did nothing to fill the empty space in her heart where his warmth and light had once occupied.
Ona gripped the gunwale hard enough to dig her nails into the tarred wood. It was her fault he had met such a fate, and she hadn’t even been the one to end Jones’ life. She had failed to keep him safe, and Franklin was … he was…
She bent forward over the railing, bracing her elbows against the wood as she struggled to breathe. A choked gasp escaped her throat, but the ocean gave no reply. It continued onward into the black night, apathetic to her suffering. It was not the sea she had known. It was a stranger to her now. Cold and indifferent.
This was the last assault in a long line of battery offenses. Ona felt something crack within her, and she raised her hands to cover her face, as if to stop herself from shattering like a figurine made of glass.
I can’t do this, she silently cried out. I can’t do this alone.
A single sob escaped. Just one. And then long arms wrapped around her, pulling her away from the railing and holding her in place against a warm, solid surface. She immediately stiffened, her muscles coiled to fight off her attacker, but then… she realized she wasn’t being attacked. The arms were steadfast and brought her immediate solace. She recognized who they belonged to, the shape and strength of them familiar somehow.
He was not cold and indifferent. He was warm and comforting, and exactly what she needed at that moment.
“James Norrington?” she whispered, a tremble in her voice. “When… when did you arrive?”
“Just now,” he responded, his baritone resonating deep in his chest, making her shiver. “The Dutchman is still a ways off, but I… I don’t know how to explain it. I sensed something was… amiss. Ona, what’s wrong?”
She had begun to tremble again. She couldn’t stop it, no matter how hard she tried, and her heart raced in her chest as she shook like taut sails in a hurricane wind.
“Ona?”
His voice, so sincere and warm in her ear, was what finally broke her. Ona was tired of fighting to keep him at a distance because she was too afraid. Afraid of caring for someone only to have her heart ripped apart again.
“He’s gone,” she choked out, shuddering hard. “And it’s all my fault. All my fault.” Her voice was so frail and brittle she hardly recognized it.
“It’s not your fault,” Norrington murmured into her hair. “It’s not.”
One mantra over the other. One broken and hoarse, the other smooth and comforting. One was winning over the other, and soon one ceased altogether.
She went silent and fully gave in to the embrace, letting the soothing voice wash over her, and she allowed herself to break. She’d never cried like this before. She’d never been held like this either—there had never been need for it. With Franklin watching over her, she’d never had reason to be afraid. Her largest concern had always been to protect him, just as he’d protected her. And now…
Now he was gone. And what was left? Who was she truly without Franklin Sharp?
“I couldn’t keep him safe,” she whispered tightly. “I’m to blame.” She blinked through her tears to find her fingers grasping tightly to something rough. Stained navy broadcloth. Faded gold trim. Frayed embroidered buttonholes. He still wore his uniform. Maybe someday he wouldn’t, but for now, it was familiar and comforting.
“No,” he said into her ear in his rich, resonate voice, “you’re not.”
Ona clung onto Norrington’s open coat as if she was drowning at sea, her cheek pressed against his chest, and he held her so carefully, but with strength, as if he alone would hold her together if he had to. One arm across her shoulders, the other along her back, it felt as though he was holding her in one piece.
“I am,” she said wearily. “If Franklin had never found me… if he’d never brought me onboard… none of this would have happened. I told him not to change our heading. I told him to stay on course because I felt something. I couldn’t even tell him what it was. I didn’t know myself. Not until I saw… saw you. In the water.”
“If you hadn’t,” Norrington responded, his voice so gentle but tinged with sorrow that it almost hurt to hear, “Jones would have found me. He would have had a hold on me long before the battle. I would have been just another one of his thralls, and who knows how things would have played out differently. You… kept me grounded, in difficult moments. You helped me hold on to myself. I know I… I can never repay that. And I can never make up for the Franklin’s death. But I would like to try. Try and fix some of the damage my presence has caused.”
Ona didn’t know how to respond. It was all too complicated and painful and she had never been in this situation before. Norrington seemed to sincerely apologetic and genuinely saddened by what had happened to Franklin, but this whole endeavor to Whitecap Bay was asking too much of him. Her cursed life was her problem to solve, not his, and she did not wish more trouble on his head simply because he was tied to her out of guilt and obligation.
She took a shuddering breath, trying to get her emotions under control, which was in itself something new. But in the process of doing so, she breathed in… well, him. Perhaps it was because he had been in the water recently, or perhaps it was because of what he had become, but… Norrington smelled of the sea. He smelled of home.
She was struck by a sudden homesickness so strong she could barely breathe. She missed her waters, filled with forests of coral and thousands of species of multicolored sea life. She missed her sisters. She missed floating above the ocean floor, pretending for a moment that she was a bird in flight, soaring high above the land with no end in sight save the horizon.
In that moment, all she wanted to do was return home and forget about mankind and their hard, cruel world. But she couldn’t. Because that would mean forgetting Franklin. Erasing all of his kindness and humor and caring words. She couldn’t do that to him. She wouldn’t. But that didn’t answer the question of how she was supposed to live her life without him there. It seemed impossible.
She became aware of two things. One, she had started to cry again, silent tears spilling down her cheeks as she shivered in misery. And the second thing was equally as strange. Strange… but interesting. Norrington had moved his hand up from her shoulder and now cradled his fingers in her hair. He moved his hand gently atop her head, as if… petting her. It should have made her feel angry. Humiliated. Like she was some animal.
But it felt so… so pleasant. So comforting. She relaxed at the touch, and her shivers were reduced to infrequent tremors until they stopped altogether. He was so warm, even through the thick material of his coat, and it was a wonderful change from his previous cold, scaly skin. But his odd caressing was still a better panacea than anything she could have dreamed was possible.
Is this why humans embrace each other so often? Why they always seem to crave physical affection? She had often wondered this, and she thought she now knew the answer as she involuntarily leaned into the touch.
Summoning her courage, Ona spoke, her voice coming out a low rasp.
“A part of me always feared I would be the death of him.”
Speaking the words out loud caused a spear of pain to shoot through her chest, but it also lifted something from her shoulders. A weight she had carried ever since Jones’ blade had pierced Franklin’s heart.
“You weren’t,” Norrington said, voice much too kind for what she deserved. “If anything, you were his reason to live.”
Ona slowly pulled back, but only so far as she could look up into his face. The candlelit lamps cast a faint glow on the left half of his face, leaving the other side in shadow. His gaze, or at least the half she could see, was full of intense sincerity and solemnness. As if he were afraid he had overstepped his bounds, but he didn’t release her either.
From what she had observed, Norrington was made of contradictions. Perhaps she was as well. Not so long ago, she would have abhorred the idea of being so close to him.
But now…
Ona raised her arm and cautiously moved her hand towards his face. Norrington watched her movements, neither moving nor speaking. Carefully, so carefully, as if afraid she would hurt him, she touched her fingertips to his cheek. He was warm, so much warmer than he had been before, and she continually found this appealing.
The tips of her fingers moved downward, trailing across the rough hair that had grown in, covering the lower half of his face. Ona wondered what he had looked like in full naval regalia, bewigged and smooth-faced with his back as stiff as a board. It was difficult to imagine, because at the moment he looked the perfect personification of a man of fortune.
Norrington remained perfectly still. By the time Ona’s fingers brushed across his chin, he seemed to hardly breathe. She had no real inkling what she was doing, or why she was doing it, only that she wanted to touch him. To know him. Understand what it was about him that captivated her thoughts and drew her to him like a moth to an oil lamp.
A noise sounded from the dark—a random creak of the hull, a footfall of a passing crewman, the creak of the swinging lanterns. Whatever it was, she snapped out of her strange state and forced herself to pull away. Heat flushed her cheeks against her bidding, and she could not bring herself to meet his eye, suddenly afraid of what she would see.
He didn’t let her go far, though, and his voice held no sign of disgust or embarrassment.
“Everything will be all right, Ona.”
Her eyes flickered up to his, instinctively drawn by his soft pleas, and she was trapped on the spot by his sea-green gaze.
There were contraptions made by man—large lights fueled by fire and whale oil—that could be turned onto the sea. Without fail, they lured her kind by the hundreds, enticing them and freezing them in place.
That was how it felt to stare into James Norrington’s eyes.
“You’ll see,” he said quietly, tucking a strand of her hair behind her ear. It was almost enough to distract her from the brief flicker of sadness in his eyes.
Almost.
Hector Barbossa unfurled the ancient charts, laying it flat across one of the many navigation tables aboard the Pearl. He examined it closely for a moment before he began to manipulate the various movable inner circles. His lips spread into a crooked grin as he joined the words Aqua de Vida together.
“The fates be with me this day, Jack,” he crooned happily. “We’re settin’ sail fer the Fountain o’ Youth, and with a mermaid guide at that. No need to steal the map now. After all, what be manmade charts compared to the ancient knowledge of the sea folk?”
Jack the monkey chirped in agreement, perched on his usual spot on Hector’s shoulder. After reaching into a pocket and pulling out a peanut for Jack to eat, he stood from the captain’s chair (he refused to refer to it as Sparrow’s chair), and made his way on deck.
Jack the human (obviously the lesser of the Jacks) was already giving orders to set sail from Shipwreck Cove. Hector let him play the role, allowing him to believe he was the Pearl’s one and only master, but she would be back in his grasp soon enough. He climbed up onto the fo’c’sle and stared out across the bow, breathing in and expelling out the briny sea air.
With a gentle touch along the railing, Hector looked out over the endless expanse of ocean and the equally endless horizon.
“And now, my beloved Pearl,” he said with a crooked smile, “show me how you can soar.”
