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He ran.
That was the worst of it, he thought. The public humiliation of losing his post and livelihood compared not at all. The sting of this personal failure had gone deeper, had slid under his skin and stayed there, a piece of jagged glass that cut at each breath.
James Norrington did not run from battle.
Norrington drank his watered whiskey, eyes on the horizon. Perhaps he was not that anymore. He was no longer a Commodore, or a Navy man, or a free man. Perhaps he was not James Norrington at all. He was the man’s bones, yes, and his flesh, but there was more to a man than that. There had to be. Otherwise all they were was ink on paper, and paper burned all too readily.
Norrington swallowed another bitter mouthful. He was, at present, hot enough to combust. Nights in the Caribbean were often pleasant, but in Tortuga the heat didn’t leave with the sun. The island grew hotter as night closed in – with temper, if not with weather. Norrington’s own blood boiled. The whiskey didn’t help, and it wasn’t meant to. Norrington didn’t seek peace or courage in drink. He wasn’t his father. Norrington drank because there was devil little else to do to pass the time.
The water in the bay was dirty and ran black under the moonless sky. Norrington sat at the very edge of a moldy pier. He lay down now, and closed his eyes. The thin planks could almost be the hull of a ship. The waves beating at the posts and the small fishing boat tied to the pier pushed him onward, past the horizon, into a blue-green sea. There, Norrington was sure, he would find James Norrington again.
A shot rang out. Norrington bolted upright and scrambled to his feet, pulse roaring in his ears. He caught himself at the mouth of the pier. His hand was at his waist. There, a scabbard hung empty. It had born a blade not a week ago, a fine sword that lay broken for the same reason Norrington’s sleeves were torn at the shoulders.
Hot anger washed over Norrington anew. He stomped back down the pier. His hat lay there. The bottle of whiskey was gone, likely lost to the shallow depths of the bay. Norrington bent to gather his hat. The disarrayed wig hiding under the rim gave him pause. He stared at the dirty, mangled ball of hair. Cold sweat gathered at the back of his neck. More dripped down his temples to wet his cheeks. Norrington kicked the foul thing away. The hat flew with the wig, both finding their grave in water polluted by pirate ships and piss and swollen, dead things.
Norrington turned his back on the bay and marched down the pier. He didn’t have his sword, but he did have a short blade and a hollow, nameless body. They would do just as good for what he had in mind.
The pier was tucked in a cove at the side of the island. No ships docked there, for the waters were shallow and the seafloor toothed with sharp rocks. The trail to town led over a steep outcrop that proved difficult to scale with a stomach full of whiskey. Norrington's hands were bleeding by the time he was halfway up. He paused to take his breath, and almost lost his footing entirely when a light burst from the dark in his periphery. Norrington clutched at hard granite and followed the flare. A ship had appeared on the horizon. It was massive and solidly built, obviously a warship despite its elegant beauty. Norrington drank in the sight of the gilded gallery, the tall masts, the long line of the stem and thrust of the bowsprit. His heart beat double in his chest. Everything hurt suddenly, the ache too deep for drink to mellow its sting.
The lanterns hung at the main deck blinked out one by one. Reason returned to Norrington as the ship disappeared from view. He narrowed his eyes. The Crown had never concerned itself with Tortuga, and wasn’t likely to display any newfound interest with a single ship in the dead of night. Norrington set to climbing again, moving toward the bay rather than upward. He settled in a shallow depression in the stone and fixed his eyes on where he had seen the ship. Without moon and stars, its presence was marked only by the gentle splash of waves against its sides.
Quarter hour passed, then a half. Norrington stretched his legs out one by one, careful to keep his grip on the rock secure. He didn’t think of leaving. His blood thrummed with a different urgency now, an excitement dearly missed.
The faint gurgle of a boat hitting water had Norrington baring his teeth in a savage smile.
There were two boats in total. Small and shaped for speed, they rowed with soundless efficiency toward the main docks. Norrington made it over the outcrop and down among the rocks on the other side by the time the first touched shore. He crouched there, waist-deep in murky water, and watched the crew disembark.
Six men prowled up the deserted beach. Hard men, unkempt and wild as the sea they sailed. The lanterns hung along the piers swung over their heads. Scarred skin and dark eyes. Tattooed flesh. Norrington ground his teeth. His hand was at the hilt of his short-blade, trembling with the need to draw.
The beach rose in a short incline. The men stalled just shy of its crest. The one who led their march turned to study the horizon. His eyes burned with the light of the lanterns, as if aflame themselves. Norrington hunkered low. He didn’t breathe again until the men disappeared from sight.
James McGraw – Captain James Flint – was in Tortuga.
Norrington drew himself up. The beach was quiet save for the hungry push and pull of the ocean. Flint hadn’t left a man to guard the boats, which meant he didn’t mean to stay ashore long enough to warrant the precaution. Norrington thought over his options, and found them in woeful shortage. Frustration ate at his gut. A lone man could hardly hope to match a ship-full of pirates, let alone one with James Flint at the helm.
Tortuga roared with joyful ferocity in the distance. Norrington’s eyes cut to the ocean. Flint wasn’t at the helm at present. The devil was on dry land, his means of wreaking havoc and destruction far off and vulnerable.
Norrington slipped back into the shadows. He felt his way around the reef, keeping to the water and the jagged shoreline. He was drenched to the bone when he pulled himself up the rocky beach of the secluded cove. The lone fishing boat was still there. Norrington grappled with the rope that secured the vessel to the pier. The irony of the situation didn’t escape him. He had commandeered boats in the past, for the good of Queen and country. Norrington could no longer lay claim to such lofty motivations. At the moment, he was but a common thief hunting more of the same.
The rope came free. Norrington boarded. The boat creaked in alarm, but bore his weight. It made little noise once it was out in open water. Norrington pushed and pulled at the oars, body strained to the limits. His mind grew quieter the farther from shore he traveled, more at peace. He was where he ought to be. He felt it in his bones.
Norrington stopped rowing once he was close enough to see the ship, a black mass suspended between a dark sky and a darker sea. He drew the oars into the boat, shed his coat, tied the short blade more securely at his waist, and stood up. The boat shook. The sea swallowed his body with a soft sigh.
The ship was well-manned. Voices carried over the waves, too many in number for Norrington to secure an accurate count. Norrington clung to the rudder, expression tight. Flint was planning something. The Crown would have done well to concern itself with pirates of Flint's ilk, rather than Sparrow and his motley crew.
Norrington pulled himself up. It was hard going until he reached the lower edge of the gallery. From there, ledges and metal affects served as footholds. He moved slowly. At the top, he stilled entirely. The parapet ringing the quarter deck allowed him to spy on the men moving on the main deck below. He watched for a while, familiarizing himself with what he could see of the ship’s outlay and crew. The quarter deck was unmanned. Norrington slipped on without anyone the wiser. He allowed himself a moment to savor the sturdy ship under his feet. His steps were buoyed by the rocking sea, pulled ever forward. The inevitability of the moment folded around him and set him at peace.
A pile of crates rose at the edge of the deck. Norrington ducked behind them. He examined the wood, pressed close and scented the boards. The sharp tang of gunpowder filled his nose. Norrington drew back, eyes alight. He sought out the nearest lantern. Most hung cold, but a flame danced by the foremast. It had been lit recently. Norrington’s heart beat in his throat. He pointed his gaze to the water, toward Tortuga. The island glowed bright. Flint’s boats stood out clearly against the garish backdrop, advancing quickly. To Norrington’s eyes, they seemed to fly over the waves.
Norrington steeled himself. He descended the stairs to the main deck as quickly as he dared and joined the crew, keeping to the back of the sizeable crowd. No one gave him more than a passing glance. Flint commanded his men’s attention even in absence.
More lanterns were lit. Norrington bowed his head and hunched his shoulders. A small oil lamp burned atop a water barrel near where he stood. Norrington sidled closer. He picked up the lamp and, upon meeting no questions or opposition, begun making his way back to the stairs.
The dull thud of a boat hitting the side of the ship was met with a cheer from the crew. Norrington froze. Ropes were thrown over the side. Flint would surely board first. It was but just to set the ship aflame with its defiler aboard. Norrington’s free hand strayed to the hilt of the short blade. Better yet, to wet her deck with the pirate’s filthy blood.
Norrington set the lamp down and pushed his way through the crowd. A crescent had formed around where the ropes hung. Norrington moved to its very edge, right where those climbing would board. Eyes followed him, then whispers. Discovery was imminent. Norrington didn’t react. His nonchalance was only partially a ruse, his nerves steeled in the joy of the hunt. All things ended. If his end ensured the death of Captain James Flint, then Norrington would meet it gladly.
The first man set foot on deck at the same moment a hand landed on Norrington’s shoulder. Norrington broke its grasp and darted forward. Shouts rang out. Men surged close, only to fall back. Norrington had reached his prize. He drew his blade to a bearded chin, free arm tight around a man’s thick chest. The body in his arms shook.
Some steps away, Captain James Flint pulled himself aboard.
Norrington grinned without humor. The man he held captive pleaded for his life with a hoarse voice. He stunk of rum and sweat, body more doughty than muscled. Norrington counted five men behind Flint. This one was an extra, brought back from Tortuga with some goal in mind. Norrington could barter for the man’s life. Only there was nothing Norrington wanted that Flint would be willing to give.
Flint watched him. Norrington held his eyes. The man caught between them begged and swore in turns.
Flint drew a pistol and pulled the trigger.
They took him below deck. He was stripped and searched amid lewd jeers. Norrington struggled, and was beaten for it. The world slipped away by degrees.
He came to in a dank cell. His hands were fettered. His body was bare, abdomen and sides warm with blooming bruises. The skin on his face felt stiff. No one had bothered to rid him of the Tortuga man’s blood. God only knew what else of the poor soul Norrington wore.
Norrington grit his teeth and heaved up. Iron bars pressed close on four sides. There was no give to them, and nothing in reach in the room around. Norrington studied his surroundings through swollen eyes. He tried to think, but his mind was feverish. His hands shook. He clenched them into fists. Under his feet, the sea thrummed with the intensity of a heartbeat.
The door opened sometime later. Norrington bolted upright, gasping through a nightmare of a man’s head blowing open mere inches from his face. His eyes caught on cold green. Norrington fell still, breath and heart and mind.
There was a chair by the far wall. Flint moved it closer and sat. He watched Norrington, expression hard. Norrington straightened as much as his battered body would allow. He lifted his chin and glared at the pirate. Flint didn’t react. After a time, the pirate rose and left the room.
Flint came again the following night, and the next. He didn’t speak. Norrington had to bite his tongue to keep silent, unwilling to give up ground by talking first.
Norrington had other visitors during the day. Food and water were served with insults, sometimes blows. Norrington bore the cowardly attention quietly. He was far more bothered by his continual lack of clothing. The presence of one John Silver, supposed cook with all the makings of a glib-tongued politician, compounded his misery.
Silver found his way below deck often. He had all sorts of questions and all kinds of stories and was in general never, ever silent. Lack of response didn’t stop him. Neither did cold looks or a turned back. Norrington finally broke and hollered at the man one day, flushed from neck to hairline with indignant embarrassment.
Silver doubled over in mirth. “I’ll keep that in mind, Commodore,” he chortled and brushed actual tears from his eyes.
Norrington drew up to his full height. To compensate, perhaps, for the tightness in his chest. “I am that no longer.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Silver said again. The sudden and unprecedented somberness of his manner left Norrington off-balance.
Flint brought a map at his next visit. He laid it out on a table and bent over it, compass in one hand, a leather-bound journal in the other. Norrington made out the shape of familiar islands. His teeth clenched over a growl. Flint turned to face him.
“I will not help you,” Norrington spat out.
Flint raised his brows. The cold mirth in his eyes stoked Norrington’s anger.
“I am not like you!” he snarled.
“No,” Flint agreed. “You did commit the crime of which you are accused.”
Flint took the journal and the compass with him. He left the map. Norrington stared at it long after the lone lamp in the room burned to smoke.
“How much do you know about me?” he asked Silver the following morning.
Silver grinned at him, white teeth flashing. “A lot. Sorry, mate. Yours makes a good story.”
“Is that why I am here?” Norrington demanded, then wished he hadn’t. If James Flint had spared him out of perceived kinship, Norrington certainly didn’t want to know.
Silver thought the question over as he munched on an apple, obnoxiously noisy. “Officially, you’re here to consult.”
"Consult whom regarding what, precisely?"
"Us. The Captain. About, you know," Silver waved the apple around. "Morrison - that's the guy from Tortuga - he was a 'retired' lieutenant, or something of that kind. Captain figured you'd do him one better, being a Commodore and all."
"I will do no such thing," Norrington said.
Silver shrugged. "Your funeral."
Norrington nodded. It very well would be, once Flint figured out precisely how useless a captive he harbored. Norrington had been out of the information food chain for far longer than he cared to admit. Silver finished his apple and dropped the core where he sat. Norrington narrowed his eyes at the man. Silver laughed.
"I like ya. I think the Captain likes ya, too. Though not the same way, I’d wager."
Norrington stared, at loss for words. Silver winked and sauntered out. He did pick the apple core up on his way.
The conversation dug at Norrington for the rest of the day, as it was no doubt meant to do. Norrington resolved to speak with Flint directly. He had to know his purpose on this ship, even if it meant alerting the ruthless pirate to the fact that he had none. Norrington waited for Flint's visit like a man for the gallows.
Flint didn't come. In his stead came the roar of canons and the clang of swords.
The ship rocked, creaking madly. Norrington was thrown back against the bars. He clutched at the iron, rattled it, called out again and again. Above him, the clamor of battle grew fiercer. Norrington hoped to hear the staccato voice of a commanding officer. He strained his ears, but couldn’t tell the unknown assailants from the crew. When the door burst open moments later, he understood why.
The man who stood in the doorway was short and unkempt, brown beard turned black with borrowed blood. He grinned at Norrington. Gold teeth flashed in the poor light. Pirate, and not one of his. Of Flint’s, that was. Norrington’s eyes moved past the man. The open door was a window into the melee outside. He fancied he caught a glimpse of Flint, but it could have been another red-haired devil. In the hell of battle, they all looked the same.
“Lookit what we’ve got here.”
The intruder made his way inside. He leered at Norrington, profanely pleased.
“Well met, Commodore. Remember littl' old me?”
Norrington lifted his chin and said nothing. He didn’t, but knew a man such as the one who stood before him would bear no good memories of Commodore James Norrington, had their paths ever crossed.
“Flint’s been actin’ like he’s got an ace up his sleev. It’d be you, won’t it?” The pirate moved closer, stopping just shy of the bars. Norrington tensed.
“The Captain’d be wantin’ ya. But he don’t know you’re down here, and I’m not feelin’ like sharin’. You get me?”
Norrington measured the distance between them. His hands weren’t tied. He could reach through the bars and grab the man, break his skull open against the hard iron. Strangle him. The pirate only needed come a little closer. A step would do.
The man didn’t take another step. He drew a pistol and pointed it at Norrington’s head.
“Should I kill ya?” he slurred around a wide grin, “Or should I blind ya? Cut off yer tongue and fingers, leave ya to live like a dog for the rest of yer miserable years?”
The pistol trembled with the man’s excitement. Norrington watched the barrel, the mad glint of the pirate’s eyes. He couldn’t imagine an uglier death than at that scum’s hand.
“I’ll be damned,” the man said, the last word caught in a surprised gurgle.
The blade that thrust through the pirate’s chest withdrew. The man toppled forward. His head struck the bars with a sick thud. The pistol slipped through his fingers to clatter against the floor, skidding well out of reach.
Norrington lifted his eyes. He caught the broad back of one of Flint’s men, already on his way out the door.
“Thank you,” Norrington called after him.
The man didn’t pause or turn. He raised a hand in acknowledgement before he disappeared out of view entirely.
The sound of skirmish died down to embers, then to smoke. Norrington didn’t wonder about the battle’s outcome. When James Flint strode into the room in the dead of morning, bloody and triumphant, Norrington felt not disappointment but quiet anticipation.
Flint looked him over with sharp eyes. He nodded to the man at his right – Silver, looking less the clown in the wake of combat. Flint departed. Silver approached the cell, flanked by two men. Norrington watched them calmly. The corpse of the dead pirate stained the floor between them.
Silver grinned. “Seems you’re moving up in the world,” he told Norrington, and fit a key into the cell’s lock.
He was given clothing and a narrow cot, to which he was then chained by the right foot. The men accompanying Silver left, presumably to tend to the ship and its damages. Silver remained. He chattered about everything but their immediate situation. Norrington didn’t press the issue.
Flint returned late in the morning. The sun was high in the sky. The Captain’s cabin glowed gold, every object within it gilded with light. Norrington imagined a treasure cove would look little different.
Silver dropped his feet from the table and stood. “All yours,” he told Flint in passing.
Flint took Silver’s place at the table. He regarded Norrington as he had upon their first meeting, only there was no one between them now to shield Norrington from the pirate’s gaze. Norrington swallowed. He may well be naked; Flint’s eyes peeled clothes and skin and left him raw.
“I do not have the information you seek,” Norrington told him.
Flint didn’t look concerned, or at all surprised. “What do you know of what I seek?”
Norrington raised his chin. “I know enough. I will not help you destroy what I have sworn to protect.”
Flint stood. He walked around the table to where Norrington sat on the cot and stood above him, presence looming. Norrington raised his chin to meet his eyes. They remained so, poised at the cusp of something, until Flint broke away with a shake of his head.
“I do not need your help to destroy the Empire, Commodore.”
“Do not call me that,” Norrington snapped.
Flint regarded him with quiet amusement. “What should I call you, then?”
Norrington opened his mouth. His name stuck in his throat, foreign, tasting faintly of ashes and rum.
“I do not care about the Empire,” Norrington said instead. “I care about the people it serves and protects.”
The mirth in Flint’s eyes dimmed. “You will find the Empire and the men behind it do not share your sentiments.”
“And a pirate does?”
Flint looked at him, and said nothing.
They shared a lunch in silence. Flint departed in the afternoon, leaving Norrington to study his quarters unobserved. He couldn’t reach anything of use. The chain binding him to the cot was too short, and the room too bare besides. Norrington left thoughts of escape slip away. He focused his attention on Flint instead, on what he could learn of the man through the objects he possessed.
Silver had let information slip during his visits to the brig, fit neatly between bawdy stories and inane prattle. Most of it had concerned James Flint. Some had touched upon James McGraw. None of it had been revealed by accident; Silver’s manipulative streak ran as wide as the man himself. Norrington treated it with according mistrust. He measured Silver’s words against his own observations of Flint, his crew, his ship. A silhouette of Flint formed in Norrington’s mind.
Time kept its unbothered march. Days ran to fill a week, then two. Norrington became used to Flint’s company. Came to enjoy it, in fact, as a welcome reprieve from hours of boredom. Flint was intelligent in a manner few men possessed. Well-read and deeply logical, with a keen mind that cut through nonsense without regard for the propriety of norms. Norrington couldn’t reconcile the man with the pirates that polluted the Caribbean’s waters. Flint was a captain through and through; the piracy seemed almost circumstantial.
Despite the mark it left, Flint’s presence did not fill too many hours. Silver’s visits seemed longer despite their comparative brevity. Norrington found himself with too much time to think. Elizabeth haunted his mind. So did, to Norrington’s own surprise, Turner and Sparrow. There was something rotten about the entire case. Something that went well beyond Port Royal, all the way to the Empire’s core.
“I cannot sit idle for much longer,” Norrington told Flint one evening.
Flint paused his nightly routine long enough to give him a sardonic smile.
“Decide quicker, then.”
Norrington held his tongue over a question. He had known they were waiting on him. He hadn’t wanted to acknowledge it and incur the responsibility of an answer. A form of cowardice itself, and one that fit him poorly. He nodded. Flint nodded back. In Norrington’s mind, a blank map unfolded – uncharted seas, dangerous and thrilling.
Him, a pirate. By God, who would have thought.
Silver proved to be two steps ahead in that regard. His stories were all of the open seas and the joys of life upon them. Norrington perceived Silver’s angle clearly. Even so, he wasn’t quite immune against the lure. Adventure and freedom. Service under a capable man, a man with a vision and the drive to pursue it. Norrington hungered for it all, appetite whetted by long years of deprivation.
Flint seemed willing to negotiate. Norrington didn’t know the reason for the man’s interest, his apparent desire to keep a disgraced Commodore close. He asked Silver, in as roundabout way as he could manage. Silver’s grin told him he had failed miserably in concealing his purpose.
“You remind him of someone,” Silver said.
“My situation resembles his only superficially.”
Silver laughed. “Not himself. He would’ve shot you on the spot, if that were the case.”
“Then who?”
“Someone he cared about.”
Silver’s tone gave Norrington pause. His breath hitched slightly as he asked, “What happened to her?”
“Him. And, well,” Silver shrugged. “You know how it is.”
Norrington thought of Elizabeth Swann. Then he thought, strangely, of Will Turner. He shook his head, but not in denial. Flint’s silhouette was filling out. Norrington looked at it, and didn’t see a monster. He found a man who called out the names of loved ones lost in sleep, a man who led others into battle and returned with glory, a man who knew how to sail a ship so the waves sang.
Norrington gave his answer on an ordinary morning. Flint was still in his nightclothes. Norrington watched him splash water over his face. The words slipped out, as easy as a salutation.
“I agree.”
Flint paused. He looked at Norrington over his hand towel, eyebrow arched.
“Would you like it in writing?” Norrington asked.
Flint tossed the towel. “Your word will suffice. I have no use for scribbles.”
Norrington stood up. He wasn’t bound to the cot. He hadn’t been for days. Flint watched him approach, perfectly still. The wariness in his eyes was not that of a man who expected violence. Norrington didn’t stop a proper distance away. He didn’t ask for permission before he kissed him, a bare brush of their mouths. The rasp of Flint’s beard burned his lips when he withdrew. The warmth filled his lungs and stomach, more potent than any drink.
Flint exhaled sharply. His eyes glistened.
“Have you chosen a name?” he asked.
Norrington smiled. “James will do. Unless you are unwilling to share.”
“Pirates often are,” Flint said. He grabbed him then, pushed him against the wall of the cabin and kissed him filthy and deep. “James,” he finished smugly when they broke apart.
James bit his lip in retaliation. Later, he did it for another reason entirely.
Because God enjoyed irony as much as any man, a ship with black sails appeared on the horizon not a day later. It saluted them. After some consideration and not a little excitement from the crew, Flint gave the order to respond in kind.
James watched the Black Pearl approach. He waited for the old rush of anger and disappointment. In their stead was amusement. Flint was frowning heavily at his side. The man had obviously ran into Captain Jack Sparrow in the past. James wondered if Flint had also lost a ship to the degenerate. He would have to ask. Sparrow made for a good story, if not a calmer blood.
The Pearl drew close enough to allow speech. Sparrow launched into some sort of tirade. James followed with half an ear. Most of his attention was on the men who flanked Sparrow – or rather, the man and the woman. Will Turner looked in his place among Sparrow’s crew. To James’ surprise, so did Elizabeth. Neither of them seemed to recognize James. Their eyes slid right over him, sharp and wary in their study of Flint. The way they hovered around Sparrow was nothing if not protective.
Flint and Sparrow didn’t speak long. Neither offered the other time aboard, but they parted amiably enough. Sparrow caught James’ eyes. He bowed with great exaggeration and a dip of his hat. James watched him sashay to the helm, Elizabeth and Turner at his heels.
“Not half the fool he makes himself out to be,” Flint muttered.
James nodded absently. Sparrow's recognition set something loose in him. He took a deep breath. Salt and water and creaking wood. Home.
He had found James Norrington again.