Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Silver knows as soon as he sees Billy hit the deck that he’s been found out. 

He’s only survived this long thanks to his knack for reading people: the furrow of their brows; the twitches in their faces; the way they hold themselves at any given moment. And Billy? Billy’s easier to interpret than most.

He weaves through the men, careful not to move too quickly lest his growing panic begin to show. Hopefully, though, they're too preoccupied with their drink and hypothetical wealth to pay attention to the frantic looks he keeps throwing behind him as Billy gets closer and closer.

It’s only once he’s climbed on the rail, escape at hand, that he dares to glance towards the captain’s cabin.

Silver’s eyes meet Captain Flint’s from across the deck -

And the world bursts into color.

Silver’s so shocked, so completely blindsided, that he slips. What was going to be a dive off the ship becomes a flailing belly-flop. 

He can only muster one coherent thought as he careens toward the water: so this is blue.

*****

“What the fuck do you mean you can’t go through with it?” 

Max looks more enraged that Silver can ever remember making a woman, and that is truly a feat, considering that time the Marquesa de Vesper found him sneaking out of her husband’s bed with a sack full of her jewelry. 

“I know this seems suspicious, but there were unforeseen circumstances - ”

“Captain Vane had his hands around my throat not twenty minutes ago, and now you tell me you're backing out? Who the fuck do you think you are?”

“Might I remind you that you were the one who stopped me from trying to help you?” Silver says, pointing an accusing finger at her. “Idelle gave me a machete, you know.”

Max rolls her eyes, fairly stomping over to the table to pour herself a much needed glass of wine. “As if you could overtake Charles Vane. You’d have been dead in minutes.”

“Look, you can blame it all on me. Tell them your source backed out, double crossed you. Surely they can’t hold that against you.”

“Vane - ”

“Rackham will reason with him, just like he did before.”

Max slams her goblet down. “How convenient, that none of the Ranger’s crew know who you are. It is only I who will have to manage the fallout of your cowardice.”

Silver bristles at that. Yes, he is a coward, but for once that has nothing to do with his actions. 

“It’s not cowardice. Besides, I think you’ll be alright, given that your soulmate is Rackham’s sour-faced shadow.”

Max scowls at him - no doubt irritated that he’d noticed the way Bonny had stared at her, or how her own eyes keep lingering on the more brightly colored things about the room (much like himself, if he’s being honest; it had been a fucking miracle he’d made it to the brothel without getting derailed by a brightly colored bird). She moves into his space, and for a moment he is so diverted by the way the sun hits her dark eyes - first they seemed almost black, but now they’re so much lighter, what would he call that color? - that he can’t focus on what they’re discussing. 

“If you are not afraid, then why do this? I deserve the truth. And do not think I will not see a lie for what it is. You are not the only one who can spin a tale to suit their needs.”

Silver bites his lip, considering. He’s never been one to confide in others. He’s betrayed enough people himself; he knows better than to trust anyone. Max especially strikes Silver as someone who is nearly as opportunistic as him.

But at the same time, he wants to talk about it. He wants to tell someone, to share this quite literally life changing moment. It's honestly a bit pathetic that Max is the only person he has right now, and she barely even likes him. 

Max, who has been watching him mull things over, makes a small noise of understanding, her eyes widening. “This is serious, isn’t it?”

This shift in tone is what seals Silver’s fate. It’s been so long since he’s had a remotely sympathetic ear from anyone. 

“Captain Flint is my soulmate,” the words - which have been circling through his head in a constant loop for the past several hours - come out in a rush, the relief at finally saying it out loud enough to make his shoulders slump. “I only just found out.”

“Holy shit,” Max breathes. She slumps onto the bed, as though she needs to be seated to fully take in this news. Silver relates: he’d been running on adrenaline when it had happened, but now that he’s had a moment to stop and consider the implications of all this, he’s a tad overwhelmed.

“Agreed,” Silver replies, sitting next to her heavily. “I don’t much fancy starting off our predestined relationship by completely fucking him over.”

“I never took you for one to hold the idea of soulmates in such esteem,” Max observes, peering over at him. 

Silver shrugs. “I didn’t. Don't, really. But - god, the things I’ve seen, even after so little time…  it’s so much more than I ever realized it could be.”

Max nods. “This morning I was distracted by a dandelion for several minutes. I felt like a child all over again. Everything has changed in so little time. Anne gave that to me. I will always be grateful to her for that, no matter how our relationship may unfold in the future.” She sighs, resigned. “I suppose I understand your reluctance to sell the schedule. But this doesn’t mean I’m not still cross with you.”

“That’s fair,” Silver concedes. But in all honesty he doubts either of them would be interested in absconding from Nassau with their fortunes anymore, at least not if it means fucking over or abandoning their soulmates.

“And I’ll let you decide how to deal with Vane. He’ll be waiting at the wrecks at sundown.”

Silver groans, flopping onto his back. “Fuck.”

*****

Silver has never been one to stop and smell the roses, so to speak. He’s always been moving, grabbing the next opportunity by the horns and running to wherever is safest in the moment. It was as though if he stayed in one place for too long, if he just stopped for even a second, everything he’d tried to leave behind would swallow him whole. Quiet contemplation has always been something to avoid in his book, but there’s little else for Silver to do as he waits for Vane to arrive, his messengers paid off and waiting nearby. 

He sits on a rock, staring out as the sun begins to dip beneath the horizon. It’s the first sunset he’s seen with color, and it is without question the most beautiful sight he’s encountered by far. The realization that he’ll get to see this every day for the rest of his life is a heady thing. 

But even while he stares awestruck at the sea, as the colors in the sky shift and merge and reflect onto the water in such a wondrous way, Silver’s thoughts are stuck on Flint. 

Where is he now? Is he watching this same sunset, just as amazed and reverent as Silver? Has he been as distracted as Silver, encountering new colors, seeing people as if for the first time? 

That gives Silver pause.

What does Flint look like? Silver’s only ever seen him in shades of grey, even when he was covered in Singleton’s blood. He caught a glint of what he’s now realized was dark orange hair, but beyond that he really doesn’t know. For that matter, what does Silver look like?  He’s been told he has blue eyes by people who have their colors, but he hadn’t even thought to look in the mirror earlier in Max’s room. 

Silver’s distracted from his mild narcissism by the sight of Rackham and Vane approaching the wrecks. He finds himself feeling grateful for Rackham’s ridiculous hairstyle, as that distinct silhouette is what prompts him to move into his hiding spot.

He’s a bit less grateful when it turns out that Vane is even more fucking psychotic than he’d initially anticipated, and he has to turn tail and run for it when the madman stabs his messenger.

Even if Flint weren’t his soulmate, Silver would take him over that lunatic.

Of course, Billy shooting at him isn’t ideal, and it’s a real shame that he has to burn the page - lest Vane catch him before he gets to Flint - but Silver’s sure that once he can explain the situation to Flint the captain will understand. 

In all the times he’d imagined meeting his soulmate, when the world hadn’t quite yet managed to defer his dreams, he’d never pictured his other half would be angry (disappointed, maybe). A knife had never once figured into his daydreams, either. 

Flint can’t possibly think Silver believes he’d actually kill him, given what they are to each other, but the dagger pressed to his adam’s apple certainly keeps him on topic: he’s quick to explain what he’s done with the page, and remind him of the danger they’re in with Vane prowling the wrecks. 

Flint pushes away from the jagged boulder, dragging Silver with him by the shirt. Once they’re away from the rock formation he shoves him toward Billy and forces him to trail behind. 

It’s only once the Wrecks are firmly behind them and Nassau town is in sight that Silver scurries up to walk alongside Flint, electing to ignore the side-eyed glare he gets for his efforts.

“I was going to give it to you. The page, I mean. I told Vane as much. If he hadn’t flown off the handle like that, I wouldn’t have had to burn it.” 

The last thing he wants is for Flint to think he’s the sort of person who’d fuck over his own soulmate. To be fair, he’s fucked over his fair share of people, but even he wouldn’t cross that line. Probably. 

“Why would you do that?” Billy asks, having caught up with Silver fairly quickly thanks to his unreasonably long legs. 

“Yes, why would you have given it up so easily?” Flint adds in.

Silver frowns, confused. “What do you mean, why?”

He’d think it was fairly obvious.

Flint gives him an unimpressed look, as though he can’t believe how stupid Silver is being. He glances over at Billy, and suddenly Silver understands: Flint doesn’t want the other man to know they’re soulmates. 

It makes sense, he supposes. A man like Captain Flint must have a long list of enemies; it wouldn’t do to expose such a weakness, even to his crew. Perhaps especially his crew: Silver has seen first hand their mistrust of and resentment for the captain. 

“Oh. I - uh, I hadn’t realized, when I first took the page, what it meant to you all. How long you’d been searching for it. I couldn’t just take that from you, not after hearing that speech and seeing how thrilled the men were.”

A blatant lie, of course, but Silver doesn’t think it’s too bad, given how Flint’s put him on the spot like this.

Flint certainly doesn’t seem impressed with his tale, that’s for sure, but Billy definitely seems to relax at his words. Perhaps his bullshitting will have some use after all, if it can turn Billy to his side.

They arrive at the tavern, and Flint instructs Billy to take Silver into one of the back rooms for safekeeping. Billy grabs his arm, but Silver shrugs him of, moving to where Flint is readying his horse.

“Wait - don’t you - ”

“What?” Flint snaps. Silver stares at him, baffled. 

“Don’t you want to talk? About…” he glances over his shoulder at Billy, still in earshot. “Things?”

Flint puts a foot in the stirrup, lifting himself up and mounting the horse. He doesn’t even look at Silver, instead adjusting his reins. “I assure you, Mr. Silver, there is nothing I have to say to you which can’t wait till morning. I think you’ve taken up enough of my time tonight.”

He rides off without another word or a backwards glance, and Silver tries not to be too put out by this blatant dismissal. Flint has a right to be angry, he supposes. He knows, after all, that the only reason Silver didn’t fuck them all over was because Flint was his soulmate. It might not have been the best first impression.

*****

Captain Flint is striking in the sunlight. His hair and beard are like nothing he’s seen on anyone else, and his eyes seem to be ever shifting between a pale blue and bright green. Even the blood on his face is exceptionally vibrant. 

Silver wonders if Flint is assessing him in the same way as he writes down what he remembers of the Urca schedule.

But Flint’s still angry with him, Silver can tell. He supposes he understands, though considering they’re meant to spend the rest of their lives together (according to all the fairytales and stories he’s heard along the years) he’d hoped the captain might have cut him a bit of slack. 

It doesn’t help that Silver withholds part of the schedule. Flint, he can trust not to kill him. The rest of them? Not as much.

“If I were to write it all down, then what's to stop you from killing me right here?”

He explains his reasoning for staying on Flint’s crew  - if Flint doesn’t want the others to know about the two of them, better he make it seem as though the gold is his only priority - without taking his eyes off Flint’s back. Even the black of his coat seems different, somehow, now that the rest of the colors contrast with it. 

“And when the Urca’s ours? What’s to stop me from killing you anyway?”

Silver smirks slightly. Flint certainly is laying it on thick. He still thinks the performance is unnecessary, but he’s willing to play along for now. “Well, that’s a few weeks from now, isn’t it? We might be friends by then.”

He pastes on a friendly smile, and the teasing grin he gets from Flint in return is - well, it’s certainly something. Silver definitely stares at the curve of his mouth a hair too long. 

Afterward, when Billy orders Silver to follow him, he glances at Flint, questioning. He gets no outward response, and with Gates's insistence he’s forced to either tag along with the giant or make a scene. He stomps after Billy, infuriated.

It’s been well over a day, and Flint still hasn’t acknowledged what Silver is to him. 

He’s beginning to wonder if Flint wants a soulmate at all.

*****

Silver spends the next several days trying to prove his worth to Billy, canvassing the men and weeding out any possible mutineers or rabble rousers. It’s tedious work, no matter how entertaining it is to hear Dobbs describe Flint’s undead powers. Still, if he’s going to stick around for the foreseeable future, it would do him well to endear himself to the bosun. 

He also tries just chatting with the man when they get a spare moment, trying to forge a companionship the old fashioned way. 

“What color do you suppose Flint’s hair is? I’ve never seen a color like that.”

Billy gives him a side-eyed, unimpressed sort of look. Which is unfair, Silver thinks, since he likes to think his perceptiveness when it comes to gauging whether or not someone has their colors is at least a little impressive. He doesn’t even ask how Silver knew; how is Silver supposed to show off how clever he is if Billy doesn’t give him the opportunity?

“You’ve never seen someone with red hair before?” 

“The closest I’ve seen is Anne Bonny, and even hers isn’t the same shade as Flint’s. I’m just curious.” He doesn’t mention that he’s only had his colors for a few days. That can stay between him and Flint for now.

“It’s auburn,” Billy replies, looking at least a little amused by Silver’s wide-eyed, guileless schtick. Silver counts it as a win.

Gates he’s sure will be a tougher nut to crack, but he’ll get there eventually. 

It’s as he’s watching Billy debate the merits of a fuck tent for careening that he gets his first real hint of what might be driving Flint.

“Where’s Flint?” he asks the man standing next to him, a short fellow who goes by Muldoon. He assumes the captain is with Miss Guthrie or even Mr. Scott, going over whatever guns they need, but he’d rather talk about Flint than think about how he’s going to cook a pig for the first time in his life. He’s never even eaten pork. 

“Rumor is he’s got some puritan witch hidden away inland. Goes to visit her whenever we’re in port.”

And that - that explains quite a bit, actually. Of course Flint would feel strange about finding his soulmate if he already has someone waiting for him. The way he’s held Silver at arm’s length makes total sense: surely he’d have to talk about this with this woman, whoever she is. Silver’s heard of marriages being torn apart after one of the couple meets their soulmate. Should he find Flint, tell him he doesn’t mean him or his - wife? lover? - any ill will?

He’s still considering the implications of his soulmate having a partner as he attempts to spit roast the pork. He’s so lost in thought that he doesn’t even notice that Flint has arrived until he’s saving him from Muldoon’s shit-induced wrath. 

Silver doesn’t quite know what to make of the fact that the first remotely kind - if you can call this kindness - thing his soulmate has done for him is teach him how to to cook a fucking pig. 

It’s only when he hears Morley and Billy bickering that he finally comes up with an excuse to go and talk to Flint, under the guise of discussing cooking techniques.

“Billy appears to be straining at the seams. I thought maybe we ought to have - ”

“Stop,” Flint cuts him off. “There is no we. Billy Bones is a dutiful bosun who commands enormous respect from his crew as well as myself. I trust him a thousand times more than I would a rodent like yourself.”

Silver can’t figure out if Flint is keeping up appearances for the sake of it, or if he’s decided after speaking with his woman to ignore their bond. Either way, there most certainly is a ‘we’, as far as Silver and the powers that be are concerned. 

“Both our futures depend on this,” Silver continues without hesitation. Surely Flint can understand that their two futures will be intertwined no matter how he tries to deny it. What happens to Flint will affect Silver in some way, he’s sure, and vice versa.

“I haven’t decided yet whether you even have a future, but I can tell you this: trying to play me against my own crew will not help your cause. Turn your pig, it’s almost done.”

It’s a clear dismissal, and Silver goes back to his work with an irritated huff. He’s not trying to play Flint against anyone, for fuck’s sake. There’s only one side he’s on, and it’s his own. Flint now happens to be a part of him. Therefore: Silver is on Flint’s side by extension. Surely that can’t be so difficult to understand. 

It’s much easier to think about Flint as he turns the spit than to wonder how his mother would feel about him even touching pork. Best not to dwell on that, on what a betrayal it feels like to do this. She’s dead and he’s not; if she weren’t gone, maybe he never would have ended up on this crew in the first place. 

At least he gets to prove to Flint his cleverness later on, tossing the cleaver onto the sand for him to use to amputate Randall’s leg. It pays off, as well, as Flint finally approaches him regarding Billy, and he in turn learns that this “Barlow” the bosun and Morley had been discussing in secret is most likely Flint’s woman. 

Mrs. Barlow. She must be quite a woman, to capture the heart of the infamous Captain Flint. Even moreso to make him ignore his own soulmate.

*****

That Flint leaves him behind on the hunt for the Andromache, chained to a fucking settee,  irritates Silver beyond words. 

The only silver lining in it all is that he gets to see Max again when Guthrie ropes him into her and Bonny’s schemes. He does his part, drops the right hints to Hamund, and sneaks into the brothel afterward, where he finds Max in her room tending to a blackened eye and split lip.

Silver winces, closing the door behind him. “I was so sure I wouldn’t have to worry about you.”

She glances up at him in the mirror, a smirk playing at her lips. “You didn’t, really. Any threat to my safety was largely neutralized once I brokered a deal. No charge for the girls’ services until Captain Vane or Mr. Rackham feel the debt has been repaid. Noonan’s death cemented that. Besides, once Rackham learned what I am to Anne, my safety became a priority.”

“Then what happened to your eye? Or your lip, for that matter?” Silver asks, moving further into the room and crouching down next to her stool. He doesn’t offer to help; if he were her, he’d want to take care of himself.

Max grimaces. “Some members of the crew were easier to convince than others. Mr. Hamund in particular was not pleased when he learned that I myself was not on the table. What you see is the result of his attempts to force himself on me, before Anne stopped him.”

“Shit,” Silver curses, sitting on the ground and resting his elbows on his knees. “If it’s any consolation, your Miss Bonny is in the process of eliminating those crewman as we speak.”

A small, pleased smile graces Max’s face, as though Bonny murdering Hamund were some sort of romantic overture. “It has not been easy, attempting to navigate this thing between Anne and I. She seems reluctant to even look at me most days, concerned with how I fit into her life with Jack. Still, the ferocity with which she is determined to protect me gives me hope.”

Silver leans his back against the leg of her vanity, fiddling with the beaded hem of her robe. He can safely say that gold is much prettier with color than without, though the shine has always been appealing. “I seem to be having a similar problem, though without any of your progress.”

He explains what’s been happening with Flint, and Max hums thoughtfully. She hands him a brush, and he dutifully moves behind her to comb through her curls. 

“He was concerned for your safety. This is why he left you behind,” She replies, trying to reassure him.

“He was concerned for the safety of the schedule, not me. What kind of soulmate - ” He pauses mid-brush. “Wait. Have you told anyone about Flint and I?”

It's not quite trust between them. They'd stumbled together at just the right time, and, faced with few options, had had no choice but to lean on one another temporarily. It's - something, Silver's sure, perhaps the beginning of a friendship, but certainly not trust.

Max gives him and unimpressed look. “Non. Have you told anyone about Anne and I?”

“No, of course not.” He continues with his ministrations, the elephant in the room taken care of. It’s then that he realizes he can see himself in Max’s mirror. “...Is that what I look like?”

Max turns around, quizzical. “Had you not thought to look before?”

He leans over her shoulder, staring at himself. It’s odd; how a face that he’s so used to can look so different. The most startling change is his eyes, of course, but it’s strange to see himself as anything other than a light gray. Still, he can’t spend all his time staring at every minute alteration in his appearance, so he changes the subject.

“So, how is Rackham handling life as an ‘innkeep’?”

She lets out a string of French expletives, and he listens dutifully as she rants about Rackham’s ineptitude, braiding her hair and humming in agreement when his input is needed. It’s nice to just be, without constantly scheming and figuring out how to survive. It’s also entertaining to see the different shades of brown in Max’s hair, where before it was all just black to him.

Of course, Eleanor Guthrie comes in and ruins his peace just as he’s finished tucking in the last of Max’s little braids. “What the fuck are you doing here? Get back to the tavern.”

Silver groans at the thought of being stuck back in that small office with Randall, but nevertheless follows her order. The more he endears himself to her, the better off he’ll be with Flint, he’s sure. Maybe he’ll try and stroke her ego a bit later tonight. 

“Until next time, Max.”

Max smiles at him, and he’s pleased to note that it seems genuine. “Good luck, Mr. Silver.”

*****

Silver can’t suppress the small thrill he feels when he’s summoned to Flint’s cabin. It’s been days since Flint has so much as looked as him. Maybe now that they’re away from Nassau and his wife (at least, Silver thinks she’s his wife), Flint will be willing to actually talk about their soulbond. 

Then he hears that Gates has come over from the Ranger, and he knows he won’t be so lucky. 

Flint doesn’t bother with pleasantries, immediately demanding the rest of the schedule. The fact that he doesn’t necessarily trust Silver to be correct, pulling out a list of his own possible routes, is a tad insulting, but he pushes through it nonetheless, electing to believe it’s an act for Gates’s sake. He knows he’s right; he won’t let Flint down.

He tries not to dwell on how many excuses he makes for Flint. 

As soon as Flint figures out the Urca’s headed for Division Bay, he hands Silver the new course and dismisses him. That’s all well and good, but Silver’s not finished. 

He’s not “the thief’ anymore; the schedule isn’t hanging over their heads, preventing Flint from acknowledging what Silver is to him. With time - and a hell of a lot of money - the few crew members who do resent him for stealing the page will surely move on, especially if they knew he was their captain’s soulmate. Maybe it could even play to Flint’s advantage: the men mistrust him, think him inhuman, but if they saw that he was like everyone else, someone with not just a kept woman inland, but a soulmate, it would make him something close to normal.

“I’m just wondering where you and I stand,” Silver says, quite reasonably. 

“Keep wondering,” Flint retorts, indifferent, and it’s like a slap to the face.

With the amount of bullshit Silver’s put up with from Flint, it’s all he can do not to start yelling. The only reason he remains silent is that he doesn’t want Gates to make his life any more difficult than it already is. And despite how angry he is with Flint, he’d never share such personal information without his consent. He wouldn’t have even told Max, if he’d known at the time that Flint wanted to keep their soulbond quiet.

His hands are tied, and he’s left to stomp from the cabin like a sullen child.

*****

Silver’s never been as grateful to have his colors as when he’s diving off the Walrus, chasing after Flint. The captain's hair is like a beacon through the water, glinting in the sunlight and easy to spot even as the saltwater stings Silver’s eyes. 

It’s frightening, though, when they finally reach the shore and he strips off Flint’s shirt to see nothing but red: seeping across Flint’s chest; his hands slipping in it as he tries to stop the bleeding. 

He doesn’t bother masking his panic when he sees Howell in the distance, calling out to him frantically. It doesn’t matter that Howell was conspiring with De Groot to kill him not three days ago; he’s not losing his soulmate, especially not because of that fucking rodent Dufresne. 

He’s heard so many old wives tales over the years, ones that claim when one half of a soul bond dies the other’s colors begin to fade. Suddenly, he’s terrified that they were all true. Silver’s not about to lose his colors. Not when he just got them, and not before he even gets to know anything about his soulmate. 

“If you survive this,” Silver mutters to Flint’s unconscious body as Howell reluctantly makes his way over, “you and I are going to have a fucking talk .”

They don’t have a talk, of course, but Silver figures they can do that on their way to St. Augustine or wherever Flint is planning on escaping to. He hopes Flint will appreciate that he was smart enough to catch onto his scheme. 

But Flint seems to thrive off pulling the rug out from under Silver, and so he instead finds himself following his unhinged soulmate into the water and swimming toward a fucking warship.

“Do as I say when I say,” Flint says snatching the rope from Silver, “or I’ll kill you myself.”

“Don’t worry, I plan on surviving this venture,” Silver replies, brushing off Flint’s bad attitude (getting in the mindset for any probable fights, he assumes). “I like that blue jacket, and I fully intend to return for it.”

He gets buffeted by a small wave soon after, and so he misses the questioning glance Flint shoots him at his words. What he doesn’t miss is how very nice Flint’s straining thighs look as he climbs up the rope. 

Silver’s not blind: Flint’s attractive. Just because he's being difficult doesn’t mean that Silver can’t appreciate what the universe supposedly made for him.

Of course, Flint undercuts his attractiveness by holding a knife to Silver’s throat not five minutes later.

Silver’s just about had his fill of these empty threats of Flint’s; there’s no point in keeping up appearances when it’s just the two of them. Beyond that, having a dagger against one's neck is never a pleasant experience, no matter if Flint is going to follow through or not.

*****

When all is said and done, Flint and Silver are relegated to a small storage room in the hold while the men drink and celebrate their success. For all that they’re no longer at risk of being executed, the pair of them are not well-liked or trusted; Dufresne surely thinks it’s better to keep them secluded as much as he can, for fear of Flint or Silver worming their way into any of the men’s heads. They’re given one lantern, one hammock, and one set of spare bandages (from Howell), so that Silver might replace the bloodied, sea-damp ones around Flint’s shoulder.

Silver dawdles as Flint lights the lantern, fidgeting with the fabric of the bandage nervously. How strange, that this very afternoon he’d held Flint in his arms, dragged him to safety as his blood stained his hands, yet now that the panic of the moment is gone, he hesitates. 

This feels so much more intimate with Flint awake. He was safe from Flint’s keen, assessing eyes back on the beach. Now it’s just him, Flint, and this tiny, cramped space. 

It’s the pained grunt Flint lets out when he tries to take off his shirt that finally prompts Silver to act, helping him remove the garment and then gently pushing him to sit on the hammock. Flint eyes him warily as he starts to peel off the dirtied bandages, but he allows it to continue, so Silver counts it as a win. 

“I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to it,” Silver says, gesturing to the streaks of blood caked on Flint’s skin. He mostly says it because he can’t handle the silence, not knowing what Flint’s thinking.

“Used to what?”

“The colors. At first I couldn’t believe how people just went about their lives with the sky looking like that, when it was so easy to just stop and stare. But this…. it’s so red , isn’t it? It’s almost unsettling. Blood never used to bother me like this.”

“If you can’t handle a little blood,” Flint replies, though not meanly, “then perhaps you should look into a new profession.”

Silver chuckles. “I don’t intend to be a pirate for very long.”

Finished with his work, he tosses the dirty rags into the nearest corner, then crouches down to take off his stolen boots. When he bends back up from taking his shoes off, Flint hasn’t moved.

“Come on, budge over,” Silver needles, his exhaustion finally catching up with him. Now that neither of them is in any immediate danger, he’s about ready to drop. At Flint’s incredulous look, he rolls his eyes. “Oh, I’m sorry, have you grown accustomed to private lodgings as a captain? Too good to share a hammock?”

Additionally, he thinks, they’re soulmates . Silver doesn’t think he needs to remind Flint that most people would have done more than share a hammock by now. 

Flint grumbles a bit, but does in the end roll onto his good side, facing Silver. Silver, who is both aware of how he looks and not above dirty tactics, whips off his shirt for good measure before climbing into next to the captain. 

For a moment they simply stare at each other in the dim light of the lantern, Silver’s arm tucked under his head and Flint’s resting near his chest. It hasn’t slipped his notice that Flint’s eyes keep flitting to his chest, his collarbones. 

“You know…,” Silver starts, smirking a bit. “We could - ”

“We absolutely could not.” Flint cuts him off. 

Silver sighs and turns over, his back to Flint. “Suit yourself,” he mutters, and leans over to blow out the lantern.

There’s a part of Silver that’s almost grateful Flint doesn’t seem interested in anything more, almost relieved. 

Sex is a means to an end, a way to get to what he wants or charm his way out of a tight spot. The thought of being intimate with someone and having it actually mean something - the thought that Flint in theory is supposed to want him as he is, with no strings attached - frightens Silver more than he’d ever admit.

*****

Silver only wakes once in the night, startling awake at the feeling of a weight on his chest.

When Idelle had first pushed him down, back with Max and the other girls, there had been a moment of sheer, unadulterated panic, sense memories better left forgotten creeping along his skin. It had only been the feeling of Idelle’s much smaller hands grasping his own that had brought him back to the present.

He doesn’t like being held down. Never has.

But this time? The panic is gone almost as soon as it comes. As soon as Silver remembers it’s Flint pressed up against him, his instinct to flee is gone. It's as though the recesses of his mind have already classified Flint as safe, someone who, though threatening in nature, will not actually hurt Silver.

Silver must have rolled onto his back during the night, and Flint, seeking warmth or comfort in his sleep, has ended up curled around him, head nestled against his chest and bad arm draped low across his waist. How Flint didn’t wake from the pain of moving his shoulder like that, Silver doesn’t understand.

Being like this, so close he can feel Flint’s breath ghosting across his skin, the scratch of his beard against his chest, is not what Silver expected. Flint has never struck him as the type to - well, snuggle, in his sleep, it’s true but what’s truly thrown Silver is his own reaction to this impromptu intimacy. 

He should feel uncomfortable with Flint clinging to him like some sort of mollusk, trapped in this hammock. More likely, he could be smug, he supposes, knowing that even if Flint refuses to acknowledge their bond awake, asleep his body seems to know that he and Silver are meant to be intertwined in some way.

But all Silver feels is settled. Like some ever-tense, ever coiled knot in his stomach has loosened after years of being pulled taut. It feels right, being so close to Flint, like the way their chests rise and fall in tandem is proof that they are two halves of one, a give and a take.

He barely knows Flint, hardly even likes him at times, and yet Silver is already dreading the thought of the captain waking and leaving this hammock. That has to mean something.

Or perhaps Silver’s just been alone for too long, and now that he’s received any shred of affection he’s desperate to keep it.

It’s probably both.

*****

Bruises are uglier in color, Silver decides as he glances at his reflection on a battered, disregarded pot in the hold. Before, they were only a slightly darker shade of gray than the rest of his complexion. Now he can see a milieu of truly ugly colors, dull blues and greens below his eye.

His plan to win the men over will work, he’s sure, but for now he supposes he’ll have to be content with learning the less aesthetically pleasing side of having his colors.

“What color would you say this is?” He asks Flint, not bothering to look up at where the man is standing in judgment over him. “This bruise.”

“Surely you’ve been punched in the face often enough to know what color a black eye is.”

“But it’s not really a black eye, is it? That’s just what people who don’t have their colors call it.”

Silver’s become preoccupied with the semantics of colors, lately. How the sky and the sea are both blue, yet not at all the same. How different the brown of Joshua’s skin is to Max’s, yet equal in richness. How Flint’s beard is technically the same color as his hair, yet so much brighter, like burning fire next to smoldering firewood. 

“Silver, I could not give less of a fuck. We have more important things to focus on than your vanity.”

“It’s not vanity, it’s curiosity,” Silver retorts.

Flint lets out a weary sigh, as though Silver’s very existence is some sort of test to his fortitude. But in the end he does lean over, grabbing Silver’s chin in his hand and peering at his eye. “It’s maybe a slightly blacker, darker shade of seaweed green. Is that good enough for your curiosity ?”

Silver nods, not bothering to smother his pleased grin. Flint may complain, may grumble, but even this small indulgence is more than Silver has grown to expect. He’s making progress with him, slow and agonizing though it may be. 

Perhaps Flint isn’t so indifferent to this soulmate business after all.

*****

It’s after Hornigold threatens Flint’s captaincy that Silver’s world falls apart.

“The gold is still a priority. You have my word,” Flint assures him. Silver recognizes this expression, though;  it’s that same earnest, solemn face Flint wears when he’s trying to win someone over, regardless of his intention of following through. He's seen him use it on Hornigold, Dufresne, and even Gates, before his untimely death.

Flint, is lying. Silver knows Flint is lying. Flint probably knows Silver knows Flint is lying. Perhaps just this once he can push his luck.

“How can I trust your word?” Silver asks.

Flint frowns, leaning back in his chair. He doesn’t respond, merely raises a brow and stares Silver down with barely concealed impatience.

“We’re allies now, of course, but I still hardly know you. You’re still the infamous Captain Flint to me.”

“So what, you want to get to know me?” The borderline disdain in Flint's tone does not bolster Silver's confidence.

“It’s much easier to follow a man than a monster,” Silver replies, choosing his words very carefully. That Flint cares about how people perceive him, that his role as a villain in the simple minds of the men bothers him, was one of the first real things he'd learned about the captain.

Flint sighs, crossing his arms. He seems more resigned than irritated though, so Silver counts it as a win. “What do you want to know?”

“What was it like for you? When you first saw your colors? What was your first thought?” 

To anyone else, his question would be a gross breach of privacy. Scandalous, even. But Flint isn’t anyone else. No matter how much of a closed book he’s been on this, it’s still Silver’s right as the man’s soulmate to ask. Frankly, Silver can’t understand why they haven’t had this conversation yet. It’s usually one of the first things soulmates bring up with each other after they meet. 

But Flint bristles at the question, as though he couldn’t possibly understand why Silver would be asking this now, of all times. Because heaven forbid Captain fucking Flint talk about his feelings for even a moment. 

“Why do you want to know that?”

“It says a lot about a person, I’ve always thought. We all focus on the oddest things.”

Flint is silent for a time, just observing Silver, as though if he just stared hard and long enough he might parse some ulterior motive. Eventually, he seems to accept his fate.

“I suppose I didn’t pay much attention to the colors, at first - I was taken aback. No one ever really expects it, of course, but in truth I hadn’t given the idea of soulmates any real thought. Once I got over the initial shock, though, all I could think was that I’d been misled.”

“How so?” Silver asks. He realizes he’s been leaning forward a bit too eagerly, and so he - subtly as he can - shifts back, trying to adopt a nonchalant pose. 

Flint hums, his eyes far away. “I’d always been told, by those who’d already found their other half - colleagues, landlords, superiors - that I wasn’t missing much. That England was just as gray with colors as without. So when it happened, all I could think was that London was so much brighter than I'd been lead to believe.”

Something cold settles in Silver's stomach, starts to drag its way up his throat.

“London?” Silver interrupts. 

Flint smirks. “Is it so hard to imagine me in civilized society?”

Silver tries to respond, but he can’t seem to get any words out.

Flint continues, still looking amused. “Of course, I understood later. When I first arrived in Nassau some ten years ago, the contrast was astonishing. London is nothing compared to the Caribbean.”

Under any other circumstance, Silver would be impressed at how little Flint had actually shared about himself while discussing something so deeply personal. None of the details are anything Silver didn't already know: he'd guessed that Flint had been in the British Royal Navy early on in their acquaintanceship, and it'd been easy enough to discover when he'd started his stint as the most feared captain in Nassau. Flint's ability to deflect away from any real details is almost as impressive as Silver's own skills. 

Silver does not consider any of this.

Instead, he stares at Flint in stunned silence as the implications of his words fully sink in.

Ten years. Flint has had his colors for ten years. 

Nothing changed for him on that day. He looked at Silver, and nothing happened at all.

Flint’s behavior these past few weeks suddenly makes a hell of a lot more sense. He hadn’t been rejecting Silver or ignoring their connection at all: to Flint, Silver is just another pawn, no more important than Billy or Dufresne.

Silver isn’t Flint’s soulmate; apparently, the captain met his other half while Silver was still having fucking growing pains. 

But how? How could that possible be? He’s never heard of a person whose match is one sided. It seems too cruel, even to Silver, whose life has been nothing but one cruelty after the next.

He thinks he might be sick. The urge to vomit is almost as strong as his sudden need to cry. One thing is certain: he has to get away from Flint. He can’t process this blow while staring his not-soulmate in the face. 

“I see,” he says eventually, after a pause that stretches far too long. “Well, thank you, I suppose.”

He smile he pastes on his face feels strained, like the mask he’s tried on at this particular moment is too tight, bending and cracking as his pain tries to peek through. Silver stands, goes to leave, but Flint calls out to him when he reaches the top of the stairs.

“And what about you? What did you think?”

Silver almost doesn’t answer, knowing now that Flint isn’t asking as his soulmate, but his acquaintance, his captain. Flint’s mild, detached curiosity feels like a slap in the face. Still, fair is fair.

“I guess I was just relieved,” Silver says, unable to look back at Flint. “To know that I wasn’t going to be alone after all.”

He walks away before Flint can respond, scrubbing the back of his hand over his watery eyes.

*****

There’s nowhere he can go but the brothel. For all that the men have been slowly warming to him, he’s under too much scrutiny to trust that he’ll have a moment in private. 

Flint told him not to stop until he has the votes they need, but if Silver doesn’t find a place to hide and just - process what’s he’s learned, he won’t be able to function; he’ll just be walking in an emotional fog, the vote far from the first thing on his mind.

He should be thrilled to see that Max has assumed the role of Madam. He should be horrified at the sight of his armorer dead on a bloodied bedroom floor, should be panicked at what losing Logan - a very popular member of the crew - would mean for the vote.

He doesn’t feel much of anything right now.

Together he and Max come up with a story for Logan and Charlotte, some bullshit about them running away to live out their days blissfully in love. In exchange for his silence on their deaths he asks for a room he can hide in for twenty minutes or so.

It’s this request that gives Max pause, makes her stop and take a good look at Silver. “Are you all right?”

He shakes his head. He doesn't think he could get the words out, even if he wanted to.

Max frowns, but leaves him in peace, and for that he is unspeakably grateful.

Silver has twenty minutes, perhaps half an hour at most before his absence is noticed, and he has to in that time somehow come to terms with the fact that he was always destined to be alone.

It had been easier, somehow, to think that the problem was Flint’s. To think that Flint was merely mistrustful or reluctant and that with time Silver could change his mind, prove him wrong. But this? There’s no changing this. 

How can he win Flint over if Flint was never his to win?

Flint is meant for him, of this there is no doubt. There is no denying that it was the captain who gave him his colors. This means, of course, that the problem lies with Silver. He’s broken, somehow.

Silver is so unworthy of love, it seems, that the universe itself saw fit to ensure he’d never be forced upon anyone. 

It’s then that the first sob breaks loose, ripped from Silver’s chest without his consent. His knees buckle, and he leans his weight against the closed door, sliding down until he can curl in on himself while he weeps.

It’s humiliating, infuriating; he hasn’t cried like this since he was a child, for fuck’s sake. Flint certainly isn’t worth Silver’s tears, that’s for sure, but -

Silver’s a cynical man, a pragmatic man, but he wasn’t always. No matter how desperately Silver tries to bury him, no matter how many times he’s reinvented himself and started anew, some part of him will always be that lonely boy at St. John’s. And that boy - that miserable, pathetic boy - clung to the idea of a soulmate. A person meant only for him, who wouldn’t leave like his brother or his father or his moth - 

One who wouldn’t mind that he wasn’t special, that he came from nowhere and had nothing but himself to offer. One who would actually want to talk to him, no matter how little his words actually mattered. One he could trust with all of him, even the parts that Mama had made him promise not to tell.

Perhaps it’s the small, smothered part of Silver who’s still that boy that’s crying now, for all those old dreams that Flint’s just dashed. 

It’s for the best, he tells himself. A soulmate - especially one as volatile as Flint - would only hold him back. He’s never needed anyone before, and he certainly doesn’t need anyone now. 

He heads back to the beach.

If he feels any guilt over lying about the gold, it vanishes as Flint reminds him how little he means to the captain.

"Those men listen to you. They give a shit about what you have to say," it does not escape Silver's notice that Flint does not include himself amongst those who give a shit. He might matter to the men, but he’s inconsequential to Flint. "Where else in the world is that true? Where else would you wake up in the morning and matter? You walk out on this, and where the fuck are you going?

Flint's words seal his decision.

The sooner Silver gets the gold, the sooner he can get the fuck out of Nasssau. Where the fuck is he going? As far as he can get from Flint, and the hollow feeling that spreads in his chest when he looks at him.

*****

Chapter Text

There are moments, Silver knows, where words fit. 

Opportunities in the silences, the pauses, the inhales - when Silver can practically feel them crawling up his throat like some eager bile. He’s been accused by more than one person of running off at the mouth, it’s true, but his mouth only runs off when the time is right. There’s an art to it, one Silver’s perfected. 

It’s never easier than in those moments. The longer one waits, the harder it becomes to find a place, a reason for saying anything at all. The words just wither away, dead on the vine. 

Silver had his moment. Flint looked right at him and asked. He supposes he could have forced it out past the lump in his throat. Could have looked at Flint and asked him to believe the words of a liar.

He won’t have a moment again.

There are times Silver wonders if Flint would treat him any differently if they were proper soulmates. If Flint could ever learn to look at him like he’s someone who matters. More likely there’s just something about him that Flint would never be able to tolerate, in any world.

Most days he’s firmly among the ranks of the crew who think Flint can go fuck himself , but if it weren’t for him Silver would never have known the quiet beauty of these waters. It has yet to get old, staring out at the pale, clear blue of the Caribbean sea, and he has that fucking bastard to thank for it.

“You can’t let him get to you,” Billy says, coming next to him at the rail one night, interrupting Silver’s attempts to find a shade of blue in the dark, moonstruck water. He sounds almost pleading. 

Silver shrugs. “He’s callous with everyone. I just get the brunt of it.”

“Yes, he is. But it doesn’t bother us the way it does you. You never gave a shit what the rest of us thought, not really, but - Silver the look on your face sometimes, after you leave his cabin... Even Joshua’s noticed.”

Silver pushes down the surge of panic he feels at that. Even when he had nothing else, he had his masks. He had his years of experience, of hiding in plain sight, to fall back on. That he’s been allowing the men to see him vulnerable, without even realizing he was doing it, is an amateur mistake. 

“It’s not ‘getting’ to me. I’m just frustrated, that’s all. Gates could reach him so easily. For me it’s like pounding on a closed door.”

“Do you often cry when you’re frustrated?” 

Silver whips around to face Billy. “What the fuck is that supposed to to mean?”

“Muldoon saw you,” Billy says, looking so fucking earnest, so genuinely concerned. “In the hold.”

“That could have been over my leg,” he snaps. He knows exactly what Billy’s referring to, but like hell is going to admit to it. 

Flint had laid into him, called him a snake, a cheat, a no-good thief. Flint had laid into him, and it had hurt, made him feel raw and exposed. Silver’s never been particularly ashamed of who he is, the choices he’s had to make to keep himself afloat, but Flint has the uncanny ability to make him feel small. Useless. Like he’s a scarecrow playing at being a man, trying to hide its stuffing. Not only can Flint see the hay, but he seems to take vindictive pleasure in grabbing it, tugging at the straws until all that’s left of Silver is an empty sack of burlap. 

He never used to cry, before Flint.

“Was it?”

Silver doesn’t answer.

“Look, if there’s something you’re not telling me,” Billy begins, mildly uncomfortable, “about you and Flint, I mean, then you need to keep me informed.”

“There’s nothing to inform you of,” Silver bites out, his knuckles white against the rail.

“No?” Billy looks doubtful. “There’s nothing between you and Flint?”

“There’s nothing between him and me, nor will there ever be.”

No matter what Silver thought he wanted, once. 

*****

Sometimes Silver sneaks into the galley. Gives the new cook a break in exchange for some solitude and quiet. He’s not so foolish as to think no one knows where he is (all one would have to do to find him most times is simply listen for an all too familiar, repetitive thud ), but it seems to be universally understood among the men that when the quartermaster is in the kitchen, they are to leave him the fuck alone. 

Oddly enough, he actually misses Randall sometimes, if only because he hadn’t felt the need to put anything on in front of the man. Randall hadn’t given a flying fuck what Silver was doing, most days; a blessing he hadn’t fully appreciated at the time. 

Today, Silver’s been left to chop potatoes as he stews. While it’s satisfying to angrily slam the knife into some unsuspecting tubers, he’d much rather be punching Flint in the face. 

In my head, you’re not welcome.

Chop.

In my head, you’re not welcome.

Chop.

In my head, you’re not -

“Silver?” 

He startles, and in his surprise narrowly avoids cutting himself. He puts the knife down gingerly before turning to face Muldoon.

“Do you mind if I…” Muldoon gestures at a barrel, and Silver nods, watching the carpenter’s mate take a seat with some apprehension. For all that Muldoon means well, his constant hovering in the first few weeks after Silver lost the leg had set his teeth on edge. He hasn’t been avoiding the man, per se, but he certainly hasn’t gone out of his way to spend time with him either. There’s only so many wide-eyed, mournfully sympathetic looks he can stand, and Muldoon’s eyes are always the widest. 

“What can I help you with, Mr. Muldoon?”

“I’ve told you before, you can call me Robert,” Muldoon says, giving Silver a tentative smile. It’s smaller than the one he wears when he’s surrounded by the rest of the crew, more personal. The smile turns wistful, though, soon after. “Listen, Silver, I get that it might be uncomfortable, but I think you need to be able to talk about - ”

Silver interrupts, tries to talk over him and stop the conversation in its tracks. “Mul - Robert, I’ve told you before, you don’t need to take care of me just because - ” 

“How you feel about Flint,” Muldoon finishes, and Silver’s protests stop abruptly.

“How I…” Silver trails off. That look is back in Muldoon’s eyes, only now it’s tinged with understanding. He clears his throat. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Muldoon nods, says nothing as he fiddles with the bracelets around his wrist, turning the beads over and over. Then, he speaks, quiet and with great pain. “Logan gave me my colors.”

Silver can’t help his sharp inhale. The way Logan used to talk about Charlotte - he’d been sure -

Muldoon laughs, probably at the look on Silver’s face, though the sorrow doesn’t leave his face. “He never told anyone. Didn’t react too well, either. Never thought his other half would be a man. Grew up in one of those families.”

Silver nods, following along, but it feels as though Muldoon is saying them from a great distance, or in a language he can almost speak, but not fully grasp.

“It weren’t all bad. At first he thought I was going to try and fuck him every time he got close, but eventually we were friends, good friends. But every time it seemed like we might - that he started to - he’d run, straight to Charlotte. Broke my fucking heart, every time. And when he left with her, left me… guess I always thought we’d make our way to each other if I was just patient.”

Silver shifts, mirrors Muldoon’s fidgeting by twisting the rings on his fingers. It’s the guilt, he’s sure, over what happened to Logan. He’s the only one who knows what happened that day in the brothel, who saw Logan’s lifeless body on the floor. “I’m sorry, Robert, I really am, but I’m not sure what this has to do with me and Flint.”

“He’s yours, isn’t he? The captain. He’s always been hard to read. Was never really sure if he had his colors, and it ain’t like he’d go out of his way to let anyone know if he did get them. But you - when you first joined up, it was obvious to everyone who’d been through it you’d just been colorstruck.”

Muldoon thinks he gave Flint his colors, Silver realizes. He has no reason to think otherwise: the misfortune that’s fallen upon Silver is unprecedented. Instead of dwelling on this (yet again), Silver focuses on a more immediate problem. “Everyone?”

Luckily, Muldoon is familiar with Silver’s need to know everything all the time, and he dutifully lists the people to which he’d been referring. “Me, Logan, Gates, Billy, De Groot, Howell...maybe Joji. You can never tell with him. If Morley hadn’t been so obsessed with the captain and his woman, he probably would have noticed too. Him and Randall, you know.”

Silver did not know, but he supposes it’s not relevant anymore.

“So they all…” He feels dread fill his stomach like hot lead.

“Nah,” Muldoon says with a wave of his hand, and Silver sags against the table, his elbow knocking off a stray potato. “You spent so much time with that one girl from the brothel those first days. The smart one, with the curly hair? They all think it’s her. Maybe not Billy anymore, but he sure as shit don’t think it’s Flint.”

“Then why are you so certain?”

“Because you look at him the way I used to look at Logan. Like you’d do anything if he’d just look back.”

Silver sighs, leaning forward to put his face in his hands. 

“...And because you haven’t denied it,” Muldoon adds, and when Silver lifts his head, embarrassed, he’s smirking, smug in a strangely fond way. 

Silver laughs, the relief so sudden and palpable he feels lightheaded. Someone knows. Not everything, no, but enough. The millstone that hangs around his neck feels less heavy, for now, like someone’s taken a hammer and chiseled off a chunk. 

Muldoon grins back, moves closer and takes Silver’s hand. He laces their fingers together, then lifts their joined hands to his mouth and presses a gentle kiss to Silver’s knuckles. 

“I can’t make Flint look at you. I’m not sure you really want him to look. Not right now, anyway. But you’re not as alone as you think.”

*****

A week later Muldoon drowns. 

Billy has to pry Silver’s fingers from his lifeless hand one by one.

*****

“If you’re not strong enough to do what needs to be done, I will do it for you,” Flint murmurs, and Silver feels it like a slap to the face, like the shot in the head Flint’s just given their crewmen. 

Flint walks away, but Silver doesn’t turn to look. Doesn’t take his eyes off the red splattered across the deck. It’s only once he hears the sound of the cabin’s door closing that he takes any action. Tells Dobbs and Dooley to deal with the bodies then more or less retreats below deck. 

What he doesn’t expect- or need - is for Billy to follow him below deck, admonishing him for not getting through to Flint, for letting Flint call him weak and undermine him in front of the men.

“Gates figured it out. The Barlow woman figured it out. The difference is, he saw them as his equal,” Billy says, “He respected them that way, so he was willing to listen.”

“Both of those people ended up dead,” Silver says, because that’s what Billy expects him to say. The truth of the situation is this: Flint cared about both of those people. He listened to them because they mattered to him. 

True, one doesn’t have to care about someone to respect them, but he’s not kidding himself when it comes to that either. Flint doesn’t respect him as a person, and certainly not as a quartermaster. If it’s obvious to him, it’s obvious to Billy.

At least Billy respects him. Probably.

In the end, the decision to tell Flint about the gold is a foolish one, borne of desperation and most definitely dehydration, but in Silver’s hunger-addled mind it is necessary. If they cannot be partners, true partners, then this crew will splinter apart and this war of Flint’s will die as little more than a thorn in England’s side. 

“You can decide. To fight me, maybe kill me, and figure out a way of hauling yourself back to that ship alone or acknowledge the fact that you and I would be a hell of a lot better off as partners than as rivals.”

If his voice cracks a little at the word partners, let Flint believe it’s fear. Let him believe it’s the thirst. Flint doesn’t need to know. 

But Silver will. He’ll always know that in this moment his emotions got the best of him. That his heart began to ache at the knowledge that they could be partners, but not as they were meant to be. Perhaps if there wasn’t something so inherently wrong with Silver, they could have been more. Instead, they’ll have to settle for a captain and a quartermaster.

Silver still doesn’t know why it upsets him; he barely even likes Flint, no matter how captivating the man is. 

Flint asks why he gave up his claim to the gold, and Silver is forced to admit some measure of the truth: “Without these men, all I am is an invalid.”

This is the painful truth, but only half of it. When Silver had first woken after losing his leg, he’d wanted to die. He’d felt adrift, without any sense of purpose or worth, and in his despair had latched onto Flint, the only proof Silver had at the time that he wasn’t just some wretched thing dragging itself through its miserable life. The thought of leaving Flint, in those days following Charlestown, had felt like he’d be losing just one more piece of himself.

Silver doesn’t feel any more whole now than he did when he and Flint rowed out to that whale, but staring at the captain across the deck, through the flurry of exhausted men racing to their posts, he feels something suspiciously like hope.

*****

Silver can’t say he’s surprised when he’s taken to the Princess. 

It’s painfully obvious he’s the weakest link, the point where the crew especially is most vulnerable. Any one of the Maroons could look at the way they hover and fuss over Silver and realize this. 

She’s silent far too long, simply assessing him. He tries to maintain eye contact, he really does, but in truth her gaze is far too piercing and he is far too tired to try and read her expression. His eyes catch on some beaded necklaces hanging from her bedpost, the beads brighter and more colorful than any jewelry the women in Nassau would wear. 

When she finally does speak, it’s to ask about the pardons. Silver tries his best to tell her what she wants to hear, and when that fails gives her the closest approximation of the truth he can manage without going through a blow-by-blow retelling of what happened at Charlestown. That too isn’t good enough, and he is forced to let the panic bleed into his voice as he pleads with her to save his men.

“I think you see our interests are more closely aligned than your mother does. Trust me when I say that we are no threat to you.”

The princess raises a brow, unimpressed, but she dismisses her bodyguard, so that’s something, he supposes. “And why should I trust a man who would abandon his soulmate to become a pirate?”

Silver blinks at that, taking a half step back in his surprise. “I - what?”

“The way your eyes lingered on my necklaces - I’ve been told they are quite vibrant, to those with their colors. I thought you and a few others might have them, with the way you stared at the trees, the lake, some of our head scarves.  That, and your reaction just now, have proved me right. I will not repeat my question.”

“You don’t - that’s not - there’s no way you could even begin to know those circumstances,” he stammers.

She remains unmoved. “In my experience, men who turn to piracy value gold above all, including home.”

“In my experience, it’s freedom more than anything else they’re after.”

“‘Freedom,” She repeats in a flat tone, and Silver winces. A poor choice, to speak of freedom to a woman who’s spent her life among escaped slaves. She gives him an unimpressed look, then continues, her point made. “So you wanted freedom from the one who gave you your colors? A man who abandons the ones who ought to matter most, be it for gold or some imagined sense of relief, seems to me a selfish one.”

He has, unfortunately, been called selfish by Flint a few too many times for that comment not to rankle. It settles under his skin, at home among the many other words Flint’s thrown at him. He lashes out, defensive.

“Maybe my soulmate is among my crew. Did that not occur to you, in your clever little calculations, Princess ?”

She stares at him, shocked, and Silver immediately realizes his mistake.

“No wonder you were so desperate to save them.”

“I didn’t - I wasn’t - ”

“You’ve given me much to think about. Not just about your own character, but about the circumstances in which your men have found themselves.” 

She calls for her bodyguard, despite his protests, and Silver is led back to the cage feeling as though someone has pulled the rug out from under him. 

He hasn’t been this wrong-footed since he first met Max.

*****

Something within Silver shifts in that long night, peering between the bars of his cage, waiting with baited breath for a glimpse of his captain, alive and whole.

If Flint makes it through this meeting with the Queen, if he somehow talks his way out of it - Silver will take what he can get. No more careful distance, no more hesitance: he has Flint’s ear now, his respect; he won’t let that slip by, no matter how much pain it might cause him. 

Muldoon and Logan were never together, but Muldoon had had him, in whatever way he could get. They’d been friends, practically inseparable (when Charlotte wasn’t around), and Muldoon had managed to look past that bitter yearning in his chest to find the good in their situation. Until now, Silver hasn’t had anything close to that: Flint kept his distance from everyone, yes, but especially him. 

I can’t make Flint look at you, Muldoon had said. But now, to Flint, Silver is worth seeing.

The thought that it might be over? That Silver would have three days, maybe four, of Flint’s regard, only to have it taken from him before he could truly know the man? It puts things into perspective. 

Flint walks away, alive and whole, and if Silver weren’t so grateful he might be annoyed at the captain’s ability to talk his way out of anything. He’s almost better at it than Silver.

“Thank you,” Flint says, genuine and earnest, “for opening that door.”

There’s a moment. Silver feels it. A silence as they find their bearings, think about what’s next. He could tell him. Flint’s face is open, a far cry from the enraged, focused mask he usually wears.

It’s the least I could do, for my soulmate.

The words creep up his throat, but he chokes them down. He can’t. Not now, not when he’s only just gotten Flint to look . The words fit, the moment is here, but he’s afraid. 

He nods, and asks what their next move will be. Lets the opportunity pass him by.

It will not be the only time.

*****

Their next move is, apparently, to leave Silver behind as Flint goes off in search of Charles fucking Vane.

Yes, someone should stay behind, and yes, it would be a great show of faith for them to leave someone so important to the crew with their new allies, but - 

He can’t help but wonder if it’s because he’d hold them back. If the fact that he’s clearly growing ill from the infection in his leg. If his sickness would be a hindrance, a distraction to the men when Flint needs their focus on his next target. 

He’d feel guilty over the way he snaps at Madi when she offers him laudanum, if he weren’t so horrified at the way all his insecurities tumble from his lips at the slightest provocation. It’s the fever, he’s sure. 

“I cannot look weak. I cannot feel weak. I cannot be weak. Not in front of my men. Not in front of your men. Not at all. For some time now, I have been holding my entire world together with both hands, keeping my men in line, seeing to their needs, and the only way that endures is if I look the part. And I cannot look the part while being poked and prodded or while drooling through an opium haze saying who the fuck knows what.”

The real fear, even moreso than him revealing some horror from his childhood, is that he’ll still be under the influence of the drugs when Flint returns, and the truth will be revealed without him even realizing.

Madi’s words, her hand in his, are an unspeakable comfort. Perhaps it’s this silent support that prompts him to tell her, or perhaps it’s just that the weight this secret has grown too much to carry on his own.

“The burden I wasn't prepared for,” he starts, hesitant. “It isn't the men. It's him.”

“Flint?”

“What he wants, what he needs, what he fears -  the depths of it  - they are profound and dark. I serve the crew best by tempering him, steering him where he's needed. I've descended into those depths and connected with him so that I might be able to do so. Most of the time, I don’t mind doing it. Going toe-to-toe with him, challenging him, letting him challenge me - it’s exhilarating. But I am acutely aware that I'm not the first to have been there, to have been a partner to him in this way. And more than that, I am aware that I am not enough.”

Madi leans forward, curious. “Why would you believe that?”

“He’s mine.”

She nods, unsurprised. “I admit, I suspected as much. You hide it well, but the way you look at him - it is as if you do not know what exactly you are longing for.” She tilts her head, curious. “If anything, this should prove that you are enough, no matter how you might wish your relationship were different.”

Silver huffs at that. She makes it sound as though he’s pining. “I don’t wish - I don’t long -I’m not - ” Another huff. “We’re not true soulmates.”

This clearly gives her pause. She leans back in her chair, a quizzical look on her face.  “I don’t understand.”

Silver looks up at the straw roof rather than at her face. He doesn’t know if he could handle her pity, or even worse some sort of revulsion as she realizes that he is even more wrong than he appears at first glance. He can feel a tear begin to slide down his temple.. 

“He met them ten years ago. He gave me my colors, yes, but to him I’m nothing more than his quartermaster.”

“That’s impossible ,” Madi breathes, no small amount of horror in her voice. He still can’t look at her. “There is no such thing as a one sided soul bond.”

Silver lets out a mirthless chuckle. “I thought so too. It’s like some spiteful Greek myth. Like I did something to offend Demeter or Hera or whoever’s fucking responsible for this shit. My punishment, it seems, is to have a taste of what it is to have a soulmate, but none of the love that comes with it.”

“You pirates are far too fickle for Aphrodite to not hold some kind of affection for you,” she replies. She’s teasing, but her voice sounds thick. 

Silver feels a hand slip into his, and he turns his head to see Madi has tears in her eyes. He doesn’t know if anyone’s ever cried for him before; once, he might have found some sick sort of satisfaction at prompting such a reaction. It would have been a sign of a job well done, a lie well-told. He finds he doesn’t like it, knowing he’s made her so upset, even if it is on his behalf.

“I do not know what to say, John Silver, except that I am sorry this fate has befallen you.”

He gives her a half-hearted smile. “If anything, I’m sorry to put yet another burden on your shoulders. There are more important things for you to concern yourself with than my lonely heart.”

She reaches out, wiping his tears away with a gentle hand. “I cannot be your soulmate. I cannot replace what you have lost. But I will be your friend, and I will be your tether when you must descend into those depths you so fear.”

He squeezes her hand. Thinks of Muldoon. “I think I’d like that.”

*****

It takes months for Silver to brave the question. Months of blood and violence, of death and sacrifice. Months of the pair of them slowly, inexorably drawing closer. He asks, in the end, because Hornigold and his fleet will be upon them tomorrow, because in ten hours they might be dead, and he wants to know. 

“Your demons are a part of our reality,” he starts, tentative. “Some of those demons I’ve come to know. But the one in whose name this war is to be fought...it is still a stranger to me.”

Flint stops shoveling. He turns to Silver, his face carefully impassive.

Silver presses on. “Mrs. Barlow wasn’t your soulmate, was she?”

A sigh. Flint rests his elbows on the shovel’s shaft. “No, she wasn’t.”

“Where did this war truly begin for you? Will you tell me?”

To Silver’s utter astonishment, Flint agrees. 

And oh , it hurts.

“The colors felt almost secondary,” Flint says, his smile soft. It’s almost tender, this expression, even with the underlying pain. Silver’s never seen him like this. “Having him - that was what mattered. I would have loved him in black and white.”

Flint tells him about Thomas Hamilton, and Silver, for the first time, understands. 

Hamilton was the light in Flint’s life. He burned so bright - a contained, refined flame to Flint’s forest fire. In this equation, Silver’s little more than a candle. He’s never been so passionate about anything, save perhaps keeping himself alive.  Hamilton pushed Flint, brought out the best in him. He changed Flint, for the better. 

Hamilton was the moon; Flint’s seas rage, even now, for love of him. Silver is just the sorry shore Flint crashes onto.

He was never meant to be Flint’s other half. He can rise to meet him, try to keep up, but he has to reach for it. All Hamilton had to do was simply be , and his place at Flint’s side was earned.  

Despite all this, he doesn’t resent Hamilton. It’s almost surprising, how little frustration he feels. But in the end, the fault was always going to lie with Silver; he’s resigned himself to that. 

And how could he feel anger towards Hamilton, knowing how it all ended for them?

“We were soulmates . That’s supposed to be sacred. It’s supposed to mean something. To hear our relationship called loathesome, treated like some heinous crime - that was the day that on some level I knew England was broken. And that sooner or later a good man must resist it.”

What truly amazes Silver here - in a heartwrenching, terrible way - is that Flint’s pain is still so  raw. He lost Hamilton ten years ago, but his grief is still an open wound, bleeding into his chest cavity. 

What must it be like, to love so deeply? To be loved, so deeply?

All of Silver’s memories of love are tinged with smoke, blurred and obfuscated. 

“I don’t know what to say.”

“You don’t need to say anything,” Flint replies. “You asked where it began, and I felt you were entitled to an answer. To the truth.”

“I am genuinely sorry,” Silver says, and he means it. 

Silence settles over them, not uncomfortable but contemplative. Silver fidgets. Looks into the fire. Actively avoids thinking about what truths Flint might be entitled to, himself.

“And you?” Flint asks, once he’s finished sifting through his painful memories, tucked them away for safekeeping. 

“What about me?” Silver rebuts. He takes a long pull from his bottle.

“Your soulmate. I remember, when we first met, you were constantly talking about - ,” Flint pauses, huffs a laugh. “Come to think of it, you were constantly talking, period. But you brought up colors often, in those first few weeks. You’d just met her, I assume?”

Here, Silver realizes the mistake he’s made. In the months he and Flint had spent at odds, he’d never once considered talking to the man about anything close to this subject. Hell, with the exception of Muldoon and Madi, he hasn’t spoken about it with anyone. Even with the progress they’ve made, before tonight - when it seemed like he’d never get another chance to truly know Flint - he hadn’t really considered ever having this conversation. Which means that he has not thought particularly hard (has not thought at all, really) about who his nonexistent other half would be, if someone were to ask. 

Flint is asking, and Silver has no story prepared, no explanation. 

“Yes. Not long after I joined your crew.”

“Since Charlestown, I haven’t noticed you sneak off anywhere. Before, you’d disappear for hours at a time. I admit I didn’t give it much thought - at most, I guessed you were trying out some new scheme, trying to ingratiate yourself to the men or even me. Now, though - I wonder if you weren’t off with whoever made you so enthusiastic about those colors.”

Silver says nothing. Takes another drink. 

“If I’m not wrong - and I don’t think I am - you haven’t seen your soulmate in months. Does it not weigh on you?”

“You don’t ask these questions of the other men with colors,” Silver points out, though he tries to keep his tone playful. Lighthearted ribbing, rather than pointed evasion.

“I don’t give a shit about the other men with colors,” Flint replies, his grin sharp. “You think I care how De Groot feels about being apart from his soulmate? For that matter, do you think I care how De Groot feels about anything?”

Considering De Groot sees Howell every day, Silver doubts the master-at-arms thinks about that sort of separation at all. He doesn’t bring this up; doesn’t want to rub salt in such a recently examined wound by mentioning an unhindered bond between two men. 

“To my complete and utter disbelief, I do care when it comes to you.”

Silver smiles, half-hearted. He remembers the wry, conspiratorial smirks Flint sometimes sends him, usually behind Billy’s back when the bosun wasn’t paying attention, or when he’d see Silver roll his eyes at something Vane had said. He remembers the hand Flint offered him as he’d stumbled in the jungle, walking to the maroon camp. He remembers the look on Flint’s face when they’d caught that shark, his breathless grin.

He looks at Flint, takes in his expression: the remnants of a fond, teasing smile; the concerned, curious eyes. He’s looked at Flint so many times, stared at the furrows on his brow and tried to parse what he was thinking. He’s never seen Flint’s face so open; rid of the stoicism he puts on in front of the men and the rage he wears before his enemies. He’s never seen him so at ease.

He looks at Flint, and keeps looking. And he’s struck by a horrible, irrefutable truth:

Silver is in love. 

All these months, he’s tried to deceive himself, convinced that his desperation for Flint’s regard - and the consuming resentment he’d felt when he couldn’t get even his attention - was merely a reaction to their situation. That his fixation on the captain was only curiosity, fascination, thanks to his colors. That he’d wanted to prove himself to Flint so badly not because of any feelings he had, but out of spite: out of a need to prove the universe wrong in its dealings. But now he’s staring his reality in the face.

He is in love, and one day it will ruin him.

“I think,” Silver says. “Right now, we’re both exactly where we should be.”

Flint doesn’t seem convinced. “Even if you’re alone?”

Silver shrugs. “I’m used to it.”

*****

The camp doesn’t get cold at night, not really. At most a light chill when the sun goes down. Most days, he’s so exhausted he doesn’t need more than his coat wrapped around his shoulders. He’s slept with less, in harsher climates than this. 

Lying in bed with Madi, her arm slung over his stomach and head on his chest, Silver thinks he might be the warmest he’s ever been. Not hot, necessarily - the unbearable sort of heat of the doldrums, burning up on deck because it was all he had the energy to do, or the sear of sun-warmed sand on bare feet - just...warm. He can’t remember a time he was actually cosy , that he felt safe enough to relax and bask in the closeness of another person.

He runs a hand over her back, the curve of her spine. “Why couldn’t you have been my soulmate? It would have been much easier.”

Madi snorts. Gives his beard a tug without lifting her head. “I’m quite satisfied with my own soulmate, thank you very much.”

Silver knows this; he’d been there when Madi first locked eyes with Eme, the night Dufresne died. The night Long John Silver had been born. The two women had barely spoken since then - though not for lack of interest. Madi had allowed herself one brief moment to be thrilled and wrap Eme in an embrace, before stepping back and letting the Princess take over once more. They had a war to fight, and both women knew Eme was too valuable to leave Nassau, or Madi the Camp. 

This thing between he and Madi - it’s comfort, companionship. Two friends looking for something to hold close in the dark. And if he feels closer to her than he’s ever been to any one person, even Flint, that’s for him to keep to himself. 

“Hey, we could be in love,” He says, petulant. 

“I’m sure we could,” Madi agrees easily. She rises onto her elbow, looking down at him fondly. “But we are not.”

He rolls onto his side, lets Madi slide off him and do the same, facing him. “Because you love Eme?”

“I hardly know Eme,” the smile on her face would imply she’s looking forward to changing that. 

“Well, how do you know I’m not in love with you?” He argues, only half-teasing. 

She reaches out, tucks a curl behind his ear. “I know what such a love looks like on you, John Silver. You do not wear it for me.”

He sighs. “Fucking Flint.”

“Indeed.”

“I could love you, too.”

“You do love me. And I you. But it is different. You know this.”

He rolls onto his back once more, and she tucks herself under his arm, not uncomfortable in the least at being forced to discuss feelings while naked in bed. 

“Why do you always seem to know my heart better than I do myself?” Silver asks.

“Because most times you try to pretend it isn’t there at all.”

*****

Training with Flint is the most exquisite torture. 

He’s seen more of the captain than ever - not literally, though there is certainly plenty of time spent together. But seeing Flint, the man behind the monster, the performance: it was like watching the petals of some venomous, beautiful flower unfurl, reaching for the light. He could see Flint, every little facet of the man. Perhaps he was at times seeing James, the way Mrs. Barlow and even Thomas Hamilton had. 

The problem was that as Silver saw him, looked his fill, Flint looked back. 

“I have no idea who you were. Not before we found you, at any rate,” Flint says, like Silver was some hapless stray he and Billy had picked up by the scruff and brought in from the rain. Maybe they had; it still stung.

“You know all there is to know,” Silver says, rifling through the lies he’s told, trying to find the one Flint knew. “I was born in Whitechapel, never knew my mother. I had a wholly unremarkable youth. Spent most of it at a home for - ”

“Home for boys, I know,” Flint interrupts, looking disappointed. Like Silver’s just failed some test. “Except it isn’t true, is it? I remember when you first told me, it sounded like an invention. One story that bled into others I’d heard told elsewhere to the crew. I didn’t think much of it at the time. I suppose I assumed that if you ever became somebody worth knowing - ” and didn’t that burn -  “I’d learn the truth of it eventually.”

Silver should be pleased, he supposes, at the implication that he is, in fact, someone worth knowing to Flint. Instead all he feels is a creeping sort of dread, like sweat dripping down his spine. 

“Only, in this moment, I’m realizing that never happened. And what is of some concern to me is that - despite how invested we are in the future of the other, you just told me that story again. Why is that?”

He goes on, reminds Silver that his story has made him transparent, allowed Silver to know him in a way few ever have. Silver’s insinuated himself into it, Flint says. Inserted himself into Flint’s narrative like an unwanted barnacle clinging to a ship’s hull. 

“I don’t even know who your soulmate is. How can that be? How is it that you can know every facet of my own story with Thomas, but I don’t even know your soulmate’s name?”

To escape the conversation, Silver allows a small truth. “I don’t want you to know.”

He leaves soon after, unable to stand the disappointment on Flint’s face. He spends the night trying to parse what to say upon their next session, knowing all the while that Flint will hate how rehearsed it sounds, how carefully chosen his words will be. But when it comes to this, he cannot afford to speak off the cuff. It’s all smoke and mirrors, these stories he comes up with, and Flint knows it. But what’s behind this smoke, those mirrors, even Silver can’t bear to look at. 

He’s not like Flint, who’s allowed his tragedies to shape and define him, drive him to ends that once might have seemed impossible. Silver doesn’t want to be defined by terror, by hunger. Suffering, for the sake of suffering. There is no meaning in that, no underlying ideology to rail against.

What good would it do, to dwell on that pain? What difference would it make?

He says as much to Flint the next day.

“The world is a place of unending horrors. I’ve come to peace with the knowledge that there is no storyteller imposing any coherence, nor sense, nor grace upon those events. Therefore, there’s no duty on my part to search for it. You know of me all I can bear to be known.”

Flint says nothing. Silver hasn’t answered all of his questions, after all.

“Regarding my soulmate - I’ll tell you, if you ask. You deserve that much. But I cannot promise to be the same after. Some things - some things are just better left unspoken. Hasn’t there ever been a truth you’ve known, some irrefutable fact that, were it breathed aloud, would change everything? Hasn’t there ever been some part of yourself better off left unsaid?” This is a low blow, he knows. That night, Flint had alluded to the careful order of his world in London, how terribly he feared rocking the boat, causing any ripples that could not settle once more. A manipulation, but a necessary one. “To talk about this would be to break the floorboards beneath my feet, to let me crash through. I cannot promise that I’ll find a foothold as I stumble. I don’t even know that I’d try. But I will tell you, if you ask.”

Flint doesn’t ask. Silver knew he wouldn’t. He knows how it sounds, what conclusion Flint will inevitably come to: Silver’s soulmate must have died. Let him think that. It’s easier to swallow than the truth.

“You know my genuine friendship, and loyalty. Can that be enough, and there still be trust between us?”

Flint looks down at the ground for a moment, pondering. For a brief moment, Silver thinks he might simply say no. 

Instead, Flint raises his sword and says, “Again.”

*****

The war has always been streaked in the red of freshly spilled blood, tinged with the black of gunpowder and smoke.

It ends in green. 

He’d never thought of green as a color of sorrow: the grief of death is black, he knows, but loneliness, heartache, that was always blue. It’s what all Madi’s books say, the romantic poems filled with longing. It’s in all the drawling, melancholy songs drunk men sing in taverns or over their campfires. Sadness is tinged with blue.

Then why is it, as Silver shatters all they’ve built, as Flint tears into and pleads for him to reconsider, that all he can see is green? Skeleton Island, for all the terror its name inspires, is as lush a place as anywhere Silver’s ever seen. And now that foliage is the backdrop of Silver’s heartbreak. 

He knows, from this moment forward, that he’ll never see green without thinking of the wild, overgrown grass, the drooping leaves...the seafoam anguish in Flint’s eyes.

“All this will have been for nothing,” Flint says, beside himself. “We will have been for nothing.” 

“I don’t care,” Silver replies, and it’s almost true. 

It’s not that he doesn’t care - this defeated indifference is simply the resignation of a man who knows he was never meant for anything, or anyone. He’s been nothing for most of his life: it’s simpler. It’ll be painful for a time, being no one once more when he’d had a taste of being someone. But he’ll manage. Loneliness, after all, is what the universe has chosen for him.

Flint insists he’ll be miserable, desperate to find some proof that he mattered. It used to mean something to Silver, knowing not that he mattered, but that he mattered to Flint. Flint’s betrayal, stealing the cache despite the faith Silver had put in him and their friendship, proves that he hadn’t mattered as much as he’d thought. 

Flint will go on and on, he knows. He’ll talk, and talk, until Silver has no choice but to agree. Part of Silver wants to let him. Part of him is still so in love (will always be so in love), it’s tempting to simply let things return to how they were. To live this lie as Captain Flint and Long John Silver, as long as Flint will allow it. But, though Silver is selfish - though this entire endeavor is borne of his selfish need to keep the people he loves safe - he is not, it turns out, that selfish.

“Thomas is alive. Your Thomas. He’s alive, and in Savannah. I will take you to him, if you’ll let me.”

He’s had several days to consider this news. He’d expected the shock from Flint; the disbelief, the anger. He’d expected the accusations hurled at him, even the tears. He’d even anticipated Flint’s inevitable acceptance, which comes after only a few minutes of devastated shouting.

What he didn’t expect, days later as he watches Flint and a man who must be Hamilton embrace from the safe anonymity of a carriage, is the happiness he feels. Bittersweet, but genuine. 

Perhaps this was always meant to be his role. Perhaps the powers that be had Flint give him his colors to ensure that Silver would eventually grow invested enough to bring these two, true soulmates together once more. 

Perhaps it is the role of one soulmate to do what is best for the other, even - and especially - if what is best for the other is not what might be best for them.

Chapter Text

There’s something calming in the keeping of a garden. 

Flint never would have thought he’d enjoy the act; he knows Miranda found growing her own flowers and produce rewarding, that it gave her something to do on those days she felt trapped in that prison of a house, but his patience had thinned the longer he stayed a captain, and in truth he wasn’t there often enough to take any gratification in seeing the seeds sprout from the earth under her tender care. 

There’s a metaphor there, somewhere, Flint’s sure: he himself blossomed and bloomed beneath Miranda and Thomas’s loving hands, reaching through not the soil but civilization’s smothering hold to stand alongside them in the sun. 

He is, perhaps, more prone to romanticizing now than ever before. 

In his defense, he’s never had so much time to simply sit around and read before; as soon as he and Thomas had saved enough money, they’d purchased Shakespeare’s complete works. 

He doesn’t feel trapped here, in the cottage by the shore he shares with Thomas in Massachusetts. He feels settled, at peace in a way he’s never been before. Tending to the garden in the back of their property, watching the stems of his tomatoes and cabbages unfurl before his eyes; it’s a reminder that this home they’ve built isn’t some temporary thing. He’s quite literally planted roots here, with Thomas.

He wishes he could go back and tell Miranda he understands now, the ways she tried to make that house a home.

Flint’s aware, of course, that he wouldn’t have any of this if it weren’t for Silver. He wouldn’t have Thomas’s voice carrying from their shaded back porch, hideous sun hat on his head and spectacles perched on his nose as he reads aloud from The Canterbury Tales - their latest purchase from the bookstore some five miles away in town - if Silver hadn’t brought them together again. 

(Flint has no particular favorite, but Thomas, of course, is partial towards the Wife of Bath.)

Flint has been trying - and failing - to hold onto his resentment for Silver for two years now. It’s difficult to hate Silver when he wakes up each morning to the feeling of Thomas’s breath brushing across his neck, his arms wrapped around his middle. 

Yes, there’s anger; an impossibly overwhelming sense of betrayal and hurt that settles in his stomach whenever he thinks of Silver, but Jesus, the gratitude nearly outweighs it most days. 

“You’re thinking about him again, aren’t you?” Thomas interrupts his brooding, sounding not annoyed, as one might expect, but curious. Flint hadn’t even realized he’d stopped reading.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to drift off like that. Please, do continue - if I recall correctly, the Prioress had just told the rest that Jews hold Satan in their heart.”

“Yes, this particular tale is a breathtaking monument to prejudice. I must say I’m not very impressed,” Thomas pauses long enough that it prompts Flint to look up from his pruning. “Is that why he came to mind? You told me once you thought he might be a Jew.”

Flint moves to crouch before Thomas so he might better peer under that ridiculous straw brim into his face. He folds his elbows across Thomas’s knees, resting his head on his forearms as he gazes up at his bespectacled husband.

“I was thinking about how very lucky I am to be here with you, and how unfortunate it is that I have John fucking Silver to thank for it.”

Thomas reaches out, running a hand through Flint’s hair. He’s particularly fond of the silver that’s begun to creep into the red at his temples, Flint knows. Proof that they really are growing old together. Flint leans into the touch, closing his eyes like some contented cat on its owner’s lap.

“Won’t you tell me about him? About all of it, really, but especially him. It seems not a day goes by that you don’t find yourself lost in thoughts of your Long John Silver.”

“He wasn’t my Long John Silver. He wasn’t my anything, really. Not even the friend I thought he was.”

“Yes, but why?” Thomas gives his hair a light tug until Flint meets his eyes. “You’ve given me small tidbits - his eyes were blue, he was a terrible cook, a notorious liar - but I don’t know why or how he betrayed you. I don’t even know how he came to be so important to you.”

Flint briefly considers changing the topic back to Chaucer. He then decides he’d rather have this discussion here on the porch than in their bed, where Thomas will inevitably bring it up later tonight should they table the subject. “He sent me to you in chains. Doesn’t that tell you enough?”

“I’ll admit I was angry, for a time. But - darling, he sent you to me in chains, yes, but he sent you to me .” Thomas smiles suddenly, sharply. “If you could tell me about murdering my hateful prick of a father, surely this is the easier task.”

Flint sighs. “You’re right. I’ve been avoidant, secretive. It’s not fair to you. I’ll finish weeding, make us some tea, and then, I suppose, I’ll tell you how a shit called John Silver conned his way onto my ship and into my life.”

Thomas grins, pleased as ever to have gotten his way. He stands, presumably to go put the book away. “Don’t overwater the aubergines, otherwise you won’t see those lovely purple flowers.”

Flint frowns at Thomas’s retreating back. “Don’t you mean white?”

*****

Flint is oftentimes grateful that the local carpenter outsources to him; he’d much rather stay in his own space, working on his own time, than running a shop and being forced to interact with customers. 

They’ve put aside a small area next to the fireplace to use as Flint’s work area: a table, a chair, and behind him enough space to put together the boudoires or benches or beds. The shavings from his occasional whittling requests or those times he carves designs into, say, a bedpost are easily tossed into the fireplace. Sanding, however, Thomas insists is an outdoor task.

Some days Flint will move his work outside, but for the most part he’s content to stay in this central room, his favorite area of the house. Back in London, he’d loved Thomas and Miranda’s bedroom. They’d had drawing rooms and parlors and kitchens and dining rooms, but it was only in that bedroom where they could be truly alone, and happy. This room, nearly fifteen years later, serves so many purposes. It is a kitchen, a drawing room, a parlor, a place for dining. It is where he and Thomas live , every day. Their bedroom is sacred, special in a wholly unique way, but here is where they live their lives. Here is where their future will be, little by little, day by day.

There is a life in Boston , Miranda had told him, and he hadn’t believed her. What a fool he’d been, to have ever doubted her.

Another benefit to working out of their small cottage is that he’s usually home when Thomas arrives.

It’s become routine: around six o’clock Flint will stop work on his project and head into the kitchen to start making dinner; at six thirty he starts preparing a pot of tea; and by six forty five Thomas arrives home from the bookseller’s to a doting, formerly homicidal husband and a steaming cup of tea. 

He thinks of Miranda every time. He misses her every time, too.

They’ve followed this schedule nearly every day for over a year, now, with very few deviations. There’s a sense of comfort Flint feels in having these simple, domestic habits, borne out of love and care and not rage or suffering. 

On this particular day, Thomas comes home with an embarrassed, almost sheepish expression. As soon as Flint passes him his teacup he begins to fidget with it, tapping his fingers against the sides anxiously. Flint lasts through about five minutes of their usual after-work small talk before he can’t take it anymore.

“All right, what is it?”

“What is what?”

“Why do you have that look on your face?”

Thomas shifts in his seat guiltily, but to his credit he doesn’t try to play dumb. “It’s silly.”

“I’ve many a time found you silly, Thomas. It doesn’t normally make you act like a chastened child afterwards.”

“I bought something, is all.” Thomas reaches into his satchel, and when Flint sees what he’s purchased any response he might have had gets caught in his throat.

It’s a cameo necklace, remarkably similar to one Miranda used to wear. Just the sight of it makes his heart ache.

“We have no use for it, I know, and it felt foolish to waste money like this, but I - ”

Flint reaches over the table, covering Thomas’s hand with his own. “I miss her too.”

It’s easy to forget, when Flint gets caught up in his memories of those ten years on the island, those last few months where they’d fought more than embraced; Miranda had made a widower of them both.

Thomas shoots him a grateful smile, and Flint can’t help but lean over and press a fond kiss to his temple. He takes the necklace, examining it more closely.

“It does look remarkably similar, even if the color is different.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, her necklace was grey, not this pinkish-orange.”

“No, it wasn’t,” Thomas replies, frowning at him puzzledly. Flint, ever stubborn, opens his mouth to argue the point, but Thomas beats him to the punch. “I know this is a silly thing to disagree over, but there’s not a doubt in my mind. I bought the necklace for Miranda, before I met you. She told me what color it was when I gave it to her. She said the salmon went well with several of her dresses.”

Now Flint is confused. “But - she brought it with us, when we fled London. I saw it dozens of times over the years. She’d pull it out and reminisce. She treasured it, because it reminded her of you.”

“That is odd,” Thomas responds, his hand moving to cup his chin thoughtfully. “But you definitely had your colors?”

“I met her after I met you.”

Thomas glances between him and the necklace a few times, eyes sharp. After a moment, though, he shrugs. “Perhaps I bought her more than one, and I’ve simply forgotten. Wouldn’t be so hard to believe, given how I loved to treat her.”

Flint, who has never known Thomas to move on from any topic until he’s had his say, let alone one he finds curious or intriguing, is not convinced. Thomas once pestered Flint about a white lie he’d told for two hours, until he’d given in and admitted that no, he hadn’t enjoyed that night’s roast duck, are you happy now, Thomas? It’s more likely that Thomas finds the thought of Miranda mourning him upsetting, and wants to move on before he begins to dwell.

******

Thomas spends two weeks acting strangely. 

This isn’t to say Thomas isn’t usually strange in his own, endearing way. Flint once found all 74 inches of him napping on their cramped settee, as he’d been particularly pleased with the way he’d made the bed that morning and hadn’t wanted to muss his work. Endearing? Yes. Odd? Not in a way that had particularly surprised Flint.

Thomas has never been once to reminisce overmuch - he doesn’t wax poetic about the life he’d once had, doesn’t speak on any luxuries he might miss. Indeed, they usually only talk about London when it involves some memory of Miranda.

But Thomas starts throwing out little tidbits, asking questions usually related to colors.

He starts slow, subtle. Flint thinks nothing of it, at first. 

“Whatever happened to that edition of Don Quixote Miranda gave you? That reddish oak one, in the original Spanish.”

“You mean the black one? I imagine it burned in the fire. At the time, I was just grateful Meditations was safe on the Walrus.”

 “Ah, yes. The black one,” Thomas says. “A shame. Miranda did so love her Cervantes.”

The conversation, as their conversations are wont to do, turns to fond recollections of Miranda, and for a time Flint will forget Thomas even mentioned the book’s color. 

Until the pattern begins.

“Seeing the women in town wear earrings always makes me think of Miranda,” Thomas says two days later, apropos of nothing. “She had a pair shaped like teardrops I was particularly fond of, but I can’t for the life of me remember what color the gemstone was.”

“Perhaps because it wasn’t particularly colorful. They were fairly similar in shade to the metal itself. It was one of the first things we sold, when we arrived in Nassau. I tracked down the woman who’d purchased them after I’d taken my first prize as captain, bought them back.”

“Do you think she sold them back because of your touching story about a woman’s sacrifice, or because she was terrified of the newly established Captain Flint?”

Flint laughs. “Probably both. I’m sure it made for a thrilling story at her dinner parties.”

This happens again and again, Thomas bringing up some small token, some specific memory, always either misremembering the color or asking if Flint himself knows what specific shade he’s talking about. It’s as though Thomas has suddenly forgotten what shades of gray look like. 

It’s only when Thomas gives up on subterfuge that Flint calls out this behavior, not so much frustrated as baffled. 

“What color were my father’s eyes?” He asks, and Flint snorts. 

“I don’t fucking know. I never got close enough to tell, nor did I particularly care to know,” he replies. “What I would like to know is why you’ve spend the last two weeks talking near-excessively about what color some such thing back in London was.”

Thomas fidgets. “I have a theory.”

He doesn’t elaborate. 

“Would you care to share this theory?”

“Of course I have every intention of telling you about it. I’m just deciding if I want to deal with any shouting tonight.”

At this, Flint balks. “Thomas, if I’ve ever made you uncomf - ”

“No, no,” Thomas waves a hand. “Little spats are normal every now and then, and you know I’ve never had a problem with raising my voice when necessary. But darling, you feel everything so deeply. I worry that your reaction to my little thought might be...disproportionate.”

“Are you calling me overly dramatic?”

“Are you telling me you think you aren’t?”

Flint chuffs out a laugh. He sits at their little table, grabbing his mug and nudging Thomas’s chair towards him with his foot. “Tell me this idea of yours.”

Thomas sighs, rubs his hands together. Seems to brace himself before he drops his bomb.“There was something wrong with your colors, before you went to Nassau.”

Flint leans back in his chair, dumbfounded. “What the fuck does that mean?”

“It was that discussion about the necklace that made me first think of it - there’s simply no way you could have misremembered a color that vibrant as gray. All those questions I was asking… I was testing that theory. Seeing if there were any other colors you’d missed back then.”

“That’s not how any of this works, Thomas. People don’t meet their soulmate and only see some colors.”

“Then why did you not know what color Miranda’s Don Quixote was? Why did you not know those earrings you went to such lengths to find for her had purple amethysts?”

“That’s not - ”

Thomas leans forward, eyes lit up with excitement. Even through his bewilderment, Flint can’t help but feel fond; he always gets like this, any time he gets to use his big brain. “But you could see those colors now. That necklace I bought - it was the exact shade as the one Miranda had, and you saw it. Which leads me to believe that, at some point between then and now, you started to see color in its complete spectrum.”

“Don’t you think I would have noticed that?”

“Why would you? You clearly could see most colors. It would have been subtle things -- little details which might have given you pause. Can you not think of any moment like that? Moments where you thought something was one color, but found it was really another?”

Flint shakes his head. “No, of course not. That would be - ”

He cuts himself off, a memory coming to him unbidden. 

It had been after the fight with Singleton; Miranda had finished wrapping his chest, and gone to make some tea. He’d come up behind her, resting his head on her shoulder and pretending to be interested in the brewing process as an excuse to be close to her.

“Is that a new tea set?” He’d asked, gesturing to the counter. “The flower detailing is quite pretty. Nice color.” 

She’d craned her neck, giving him a sideways, bewildered stare. “The lilacs? I’ve had these for years, James. You’ve drunk from this cup yourself.”

That moment and what feels like a dozen other little incidents come to him all at once: a jacket of Rackham’s he’d once found tolerable which had been upon further inspection just as gaudy as the rest of his wardrobe; how odd it had seemed to him that Eleanor would have the same hairpin in two different colors; how hilarious he’d thought it that Richard Guthrie had started to wear a brown wig instead of gray, as though he believed it might make him seem younger; how he’d been convinced that Vane’s eyes had been a pale grey until that meeting in Eleanor’s tavern over the Urca gold, where he’d realized they were in fact blue.

He relays these instances and a few more to Thomas, who - brilliant as he is - makes an interesting observation.

“All these moments happened after you captured the ship with the Urca schedule. Did anything happen that could have prompted you to see more color?”

“Thomas, the only thing that can make a person see any color is meeting their soulmate. And as you very well know, I’d already met mine.”

“Well, perhaps you have more than one,” Thomas suggests. 

Flint stares at him. “No one has two soulmates. Your soulmate is your other half, not third.”

Thomas shrugs, unconcerned that he’s essentially dismissing thousands of years of traditions and beliefs. “I many times wondered how it was that Miranda was not my soulmate. You’d understand more than anyone how very deeply I loved her. And then, when you came along, it seemed as though we three were meant to be together. Like we were all part of one another. I know you felt the same.”

Flint nods, staring down at his half-full teacup. “But even if I did have a second soulmate - which I don’t because that would be ridiculous - who would it be if not Miranda? For fuck’s sake, I started a war for her.”

Thomas is silent for a long while. This of course gives Flint pause, for if he knows anything about Thomas, it is that the man loves to talk, especially if that talking involves an argument or debate of any kind. He glances up to see Thomas tugging on the sleeves of his shirt - a habit he’d picked up in Bedlam, he’d told Flint. 

“What is it?” He prompts. 

“I hesitate to say this, only because it upsets you so terribly whenever I - ”

“Thomas,” Flint interrupts.

“I was just thinking - wasn’t there one particular person who came into your life when you took that particular ship?”

Flint catches his meaning instantly. “ Silver? You think John fucking Silver could be - ”

Thomas continues, probably both anxious to cut off an impending tirade about Silver and eager to discuss this new scenario he’s concocted. 

“You said he had his colors, didn’t you? But he was always so reluctant to talk about his soulmate. What if it was because he believed his soulmate - you, in this case - had already found theirs?”

“That’s - ”

“From what little you’ve told me about your relationship, it really does sound like you were two sides of the same coin. And darling, the pair of you were so clearly in love - ”

There’s a sudden crash, and it honestly takes a moment for Flint to realize the noise had been him breaking his teacup with how tightly he’d been gripping it. 

“Oh dear,” Thomas sighs, moving forward and carefully picking the shards of the counter. “I thought you knew.”

Flint gets up and grabs a trowel, pressing it against the cut on his hand to stop the bleeding. “You thought I knew I was i n love with Silver?”

“And that he was in love with you, yes,” Thomas replies, far too easily. He tosses the pieces of glass and grabs a bandage - kept in the kitchen for just this sort of incident - wrapping it around Flint’s hand. “It’s been clear to me since you told me about the island - the things he said, the way he said them - plus, given how long it took you to actually tell me -”

“That’s not - we weren’t - “

Thomas tucks in the loose end of the bandage, glancing up at him with a reassuring smile. “I know, darling. But even if you had been, I wouldn’t hold that against you.”

“This is ludicrous. He’s not mine. He - he already had a soulmate. He told me about her.”

“Did he ever mention anything of substance about them? Did he even say it was a woman? ”

Flint wracks his brain, running through their every conversation. “He - the night I told him about you - he seemed so lost. I asked how he could be satisfied, being so far from his soulmate, and he insisted that he was exactly where they needed him to be. That’s something specific.”

Thomas gives him a horribly sad sort of look. “What if where he believed his soulmate needed him was across a fire, listening but keeping his distance? What if he believed that what his soulmate truly needed was not something he could give?”

Flint shakes his head. “Thomas, this is - it’s more likely they died and he just didn’t want to admit it.”

“Yes, that is more likely. It was also more likely that I was dead, not squirreled away on a plantation on the continent,” Thomas says. He cups Flint’s face, stroking his thumbs along his cheekbones. “We don’t have to talk about this now. I can tell it’s upsetting you. Let’s get you a new cup of tea, and we can talk about what book you’re reading, or the collection of dirty limericks was asked to rebind today, or nothing at all, if you prefer.”

Flint gives him a sideways glance. 

“Ten years ago, if a discussion got me worked up, you would have kept needling at the issue until there wasn’t a single thought of mine left unturned.”

Thomas shrugs. “Yes, well...ten years go we both didn’t have a decade’s worth of trauma to work through. I’ve learned to pick my battles.” 

And so they move to the settee in front of the fire, Flint leaning his head against Thomas’s shoulder, letting him run long fingers through his hair.

It would be soothing - has been, in the past - were it not for the cacophony of thoughts crashing into each other in Flint’s mind.

He’s thought of Silver often, since he and Thomas were first reunited. There are some days where it feels like all he ever thinks of is Silver, no matter how infrequently he puts any of those thoughts to words. He has these past few years gone over every exchange he and Silver had - no matter how inconsequential it may have seemed at the time - searching for any sign of disloyalty, any hint of an ulterior motive. 

He’d given up looking, made tentative peace with the fact that Silver’s actions had been borne out of love for Madi - and perhaps Flint - misguided though they were. But now he finds himself thinking further back, to those days before he’d ever considered Silver someone worth knowing.

Silver had brought up colors often, in those first few weeks. Flint had thought him precocious, insolent even, but hadn’t given it any more thought. 

He thinks about the tentative look on Silver’s face when he’d asked Flint about a bruise, of all things; the way his hand had been curled in a tense fist, how forced his casual tone had been. He thinks about a conversation he’d overheard, Silver asking Billy about the shade of Flint’s hair with poorly concealed wonder in his voice. The barely hidden disappointment on his face when Flint ignored his comment on the vividness of freshly spilled blood. 

And - oh, God , - the way Silver’s eyes had gone wide after he’d asked Flint directly about his colors, the way he’d interrupted to ask about London, his voice oddly strangled…

What had Silver said, as he’d walked away from that porch? That he’d been relieved to know he wasn’t alone?

“Fuck,” Flint says at last, horrified and thrilled all at once. “I think Silver’s my soulmate.”

“I know, dear. Now what are you going to do about it?”

******

The first thing Jack Rackham says when he sees Flint in the tavern is a very loud: “Oh, fuck no.” 

This has the dual effect of making Thomas burst out laughing, and irritating the shit out of Flint. Truly, the only person who’s ever been more adept than Jack Rackham at annoying Flint is John Silver. 

Rackham rushes over, all but ignoring Thomas in his haste to get to Flint. “What the fuck are you doing here?”

“I’m looking for Silver,” Flint says flatly, letting his annoyance show on his face.

“ We are looking for Silver,” Thomas interjects, leaning into Flint’s space to offer his hand. “Thomas Hamilton. You must be Captain Rackham.”

Rackham blinks. Opens his mouth, closes it. Looks between Flint and Thomas. “Yes, that would be me. I hate to be blunt, but who exactly are you?”

And that - that’s actually a bit of a surprise. Flint can feel some of that old anger toward Silver dissipate slightly; there’s still plenty of it, but he’d always felt betrayed that Silver would have shared his story with Rackham, of all people. It seems that he hadn’t after all.

“I’m James’s soulmate,” Thomas says, like it’s nothing, like he isn’t the chink in the great Captain Flint’s armor. Flint feels himself stiffen, and covers his slight discomfort with a glare, daring Rackham to say anything.

Rackham’s face is a picture. It’s like he’s been slapped. Then, of all things, he starts to smile. Before Flint can give him a solid punch to the gut for mocking them, Rackham speaks. “My god, you and Anne make quite a pair, don’t you?” He shakes his head, a wry grin spreading across his face. “Max is in her office. She’d know better than me where Silver might be. I wish you all the best in your quest for revenge, though my money is on Silver talking his way out of that bullet. I think I’ll let you surprise her - let her sweat the way you made me.”

Flint has always maintained that any conversation with Rackham that can end, should end. So he doesn’t linger, doesn’t correct his assumptions about his intentions with Silver, simply gets up and walks toward the closed door of the office, trying very hard not to think of Eleanor, of the way she’d looked at him with such trust as she’d died in his arms.

Fuck, the sooner they get off Nassau the better. 

Thomas says their goodbyes to Rackham, catching up to Flint easily with his long legs. “Why exactly did the Captain compare you to Anne Bonny?”

Flint takes a moment to be impressed at how intently Thomas has clearly been listening to his stories of Nassau, to remember Anne Bonny’s name from the perhaps two times he’s mentioned her. “Couldn’t tell you. We both have red hair, I suppose.”

He lets himself into the office, without bothering to knock. Rude, but necessary. 

Anne Bonny leaps to her feet from where she’d been sitting in Max’s lap, red cheeks clearly visible without her signature hat to hide behind.

Ah. 

“Oh, I see,” Thomas grins. “How lovely!”

Thomas’s words draw the women’s attention to who exactly is standing in the doorway. Bonny has her daggers drawn in seconds, taking a menacing step forward.

“The fuck you want?”

Flint draws his sword, positioning himself in front of Thomas. “I have no quarrel here, Miss Bonny. It’s only information I’m after. But if you take one step toward him, you will find I am still quite willing to get my blade bloody.”

Bonny glances back at Max. At Max’s nod, she sheaths her blades. 

“You want to find John Silver,” Max says.

“Yes.”

Max sighs, pulling out a piece of paper and scribbling something on it. “To be honest, I expected you much sooner than this. It’s a difficult thing, staying away from one’s soulmate.”

That - 

“You knew ?” Flint demands, outraged. How Max, of all fucking people, could know before him - how Silver could this woman he’d barely known - 

“As far as I know, I’m the only one he told,” Max says, not looking up from the note she’s writing “If that’s what you’re so angry about. He fucked me over, going back on that deal with Vane, but he insisted he could not betray his soulmate.”

It takes a moment for Flint to realize what she’s talking about: the Urca schedule. 

And - God fucking damnit, there’s yet another interaction with Silver that makes all the more sense in hindsight. He’d been so strangely earnest that night, so insistent that he hadn’t been planning on giving Vane the schedule. At the time, Flint had thought he’d been trying to save his own skin, avoid retribution. Don’t you want to talk? He’d asked, looking up at Flint with such wide eyes. Fuck, no wonder he’d looked so dejected when Flint left that night. Silver had thought he was finally meeting his soulmate, and Flint - well, to Silver, it would have seemed like Flint was outright rejecting him.

Max passes him the paper. “Give this to Eme at the tavern - she’s doing a supply run at the moment. She’ll grant you passage to the new Maroon camp.”

Flint takes the note for Eme, grabbing Thomas’s arm to leave. Before they go, Max calls out to them.

“I won’t wish you well. Honestly, I’ll be glad to see the back of you. But when Silver first found you - he was happy. You made him happy. It suited him,” she smiles, for the first time. “He lost that, during your war. Perhaps you can bring that light back into his eyes.”

*******

The joy Flint feels at seeing Madi again, at having her pull him into an embrace as soon as she sees him, is undercut greatly by the confirmation that Silver’s not here.

“He left not long after he sent you away,” Madi tells him over tea in her quarters. “I didn’t try to stop him.”

Flint nods. He doesn’t blame her, though he can tell from the taut corners of her mouth that it was not an easy decision.

“James worried that might be the case,” Thomas says, and Madi, for the first time since Flint’s known her, fidgets, as though she’s uncomfortable. And Flint has an epiphany.

“You know, don’t you?” He asks. “Silver told you we’re soulmates.”

Madi’s eyes widen. “I didn’t realize he’d shared this with you.”

There’s an unspoken accusation in her voice: if you knew, why did you not try to keep him with you?

“He didn’t. Thomas and I discovered it not a month ago.”

“But how? He didn’t give you any colors.”

“That’s not entirely true,” Flint replies, and he and Thomas go about explaining the realizations they’d come to, the little incidents that had added up to only one explanation.

"Before you go to him, I must know - what are your intentions?" Madi asks, looking stern. "I know the suffering this has caused him. I know how you have haunted his heart. For all that I am angry with him, for all that he has caused me pain, he still matters to me."

"I love him. Before, I wouldn't let myself acknowledge it. I was too caught up in my grief over Thomas and Miranda. Now, looking back, it's so obvious to me. I loved him even before we met you, Madi. Is that enough?"

She smiles. "I suppose Silver will have to decide that."

“We’d hoped that he might be here, or that you’d at least know where he’d gone, if it’s not too much to - ”

“He’s in Padstow,” Madi interrupts Thomas without hesitation.

“He’s what ?” Flint asks,  dumbfounded. “Why the fuck would he go there?”

“Why do you think, Captain?” She stands, going to her desk and returning with a letter in Silver’s hand. 

The first page consists of Silver’s hopes that Madi and her mother are well, his concerns that Max won’t be willing to pass his letter on when it reaches Nassau. But the second? 

I’ve found myself in Padstow, Silver writes, and Flint can almost hear his voice. I’m certain I’ve told you before, but it’s where Flint was born. I know I seem a lovesick fool, and a pitiful one at that, but I suppose that’s what I am. True soulmates have an unquestionable connection, they say. Where one ends, the other begins. I thought it fitting, that I would eventually end where Flint began. Perhaps it’s just my flair for the dramatic.

Flint finishes the letter, then passes it to Thomas, speechless. It was one thing to have Thomas say he thought Silver might love Flint, and another thing entirely to see, clear as day, Silver write as much to Madi. To call himself lovesick as though it’s a given, something Madi would expect from him. 

Thomas, however, has different priorities.

“I can’t believe that bastard is going to make us go back to fucking England.”

*****

In the end, it’s not so difficult to find Silver. All they have to do is ask after a relative newcomer to town, a man with one leg, and they’re immediately pointed towards a hill by the shore. 

Flint has imagined meeting Silver again what feels like hundreds of times since they parted; lately, these thoughts have taken on a different tone, but they’ve all had one thing in common: not once had these imaginings involved a quiet Silver.

Because that’s what he is, as Flint and Thomas approach; quiet. He doesn’t say a word as Flint joins him, sitting next to Silver on a bench that hadn’t been here when he’d been a boy. There’s a stillness to him, as well, a sort of weary resignation settled into every line of his body. The dark circles under his eyes are just the same as they’d been when Flint had last seen them, despite the lack of war or crew or legend threatening to swallow him whole. His beard, at least, isn’t the wild tangle it once was.

“Are you just going to stare at me, or don’t you have anything to say?” Silver says after a time. Even his voice sounds different; softer, less confident.

“And what do you imagine I have to say?”

“A great many things, I’m sure. But if you’re going to kill me, I’d rather just get it over with than hear a soliloquy, if it’s all the same to you. I know what I’ve done. You don’t need to remind me.”

That gives Flint pause. “You think I came all this way for revenge? To right the wrongs you’ve done me?”

Silver has yet to look at him, his response directed at the sea. “You’re the sort of person who needs closure. Some kind of resolution. What resolution is there for us other than this?”

Flint hesitates, weighing his words carefully. “It’s true that I still hold some resentment towards you. That kind of betrayal isn’t something I take lightly.”

“You’ve killed men for less,” Silver agrees. He sounds almost numb, too tired to worry over his fate.

“Yes, but those men weren’t my soulmate,” Flint says pointedly, letting the word hang between them.

Silver’s entire body stiffens, his fists clenching. His jaw tightens, in that way he always used to do when he felt overcome, overwhelmed. Two years, it would seem, was not enough to unlearn Silver. 

Still, he doesn’t look at Flint. “Madi told you, then.”

“We figured it out ourselves, believe it or not.”

“And you thought living with an unrequited soul bond wasn’t punishment enough? It wasn’t enough suffering?”

“I don’t want you to suffer. Not at my hand, or your own,” Flint says. He reaches to clasp Silver’s shoulder, but hesitates at the last moment. It feels like there’s some uncrossable chasm between them, as though if he were to touch Silver this scene would collapse around him. “If you had just told me - ”

“And said what , exactly?” Silver demands, finally, finally turning to face him. Flint would have been pleased to at last get a real reaction out of Silver, but all he can focus on how very blue his eyes are - just as he remembered. “What could I have possibly said to make you believe me? Or better yet, to make you see me as anything other than some imposter, trying to replace something you’d already had?”

Flint has seen pain like this in Silver’s eyes before: when he’d first lost his leg; when they’d thought Madi gone; even that last day, on Skeleton Island, when he’d held a shaking pistol to Flint’s chest. But Silver - Silver would never talk about his pain, not really. For all that Flint could read the man’s moods, even his thoughts at times, he hardly ever spoke about the depth of his true feelings. 

“What would I have ever been to you other than some - some pathetic creature , trailing along and grasping at your tailcoats, desperate for any scrap of attention you’d bestow upon me? Any affection, any - any love -” Silver stutters over the word, as though the thought of talking of love between the two of them would be too much for Flint to allow. “ - you felt for me would have been borne of pity at best, for the poor, lonely fool so unworthy universe could not bear to bind anyone to him.”

“You’re not - ”

“I didn’t understand the weight of it, the colors. I wanted to see them, yes, but - what a privilege it must be, to bestow them upon another. To know that one day you would matter so much to someone else, you would be so integral to their lives, that the very manner in which they see the world would be fundamentally altered. But I - ” Silver cuts himself off, voice breaking. He shakes his head, staring off at some imagined sight over Flint’s shoulder.

God, how Flint wishes Silver would turn away now, if only so he wouldn’t have to see the way his eyes have gone red at the edges, the way his lip trembles.

“You told me, back then, that I would find myself casting about in the darkness, looking for some proof that I mattered when there was none to be found. But you see, Captain, I always knew. I knew long before that day. Why would I need to look when you were right in front of me, a constant reminder?” He glances over at Thomas, lets out a hollow chuckle. “And now you’ve brought your true soulmate here! Who better to demonstrate the meaningless of my existence? I was half a man long before Howell took his blade to my leg.”

“John - ” Again, Flint tries to derail Silver, to interrupt his tirade, and again he is interrupted. Silver has more than two years of pain to unload, after all.

“It’s all well and good for you to say ‘you should have told me,’ but I - even in those last few months, when we were as close as two people could be, I couldn’t - it was a burden I couldn’t - wouldn’t - ”

“I thought aubergine blossoms were white, before I met you,” Flint says, the words coming out rushed and frantic in his haste to just get that look off Silver’s face .

It works in that Silver stops dead in his tracks, staring at Flint like he’s lost his mind. There are still tear stains on his cheeks, but at least he’s lost that despairing, hunted look. “I don’t - eggplants?”

Flint hears a deep sigh from behind him, no doubt Thomas bemoaning his lack of romantic finesse. He hears the rustle of footsteps against grass, soft and fading, as Thomas walks away to gives the two of them some much needed privacy.

“It was strange, to me, that a fruit so bright had a flower so plain. For ten years I watched as Miranda would grow them, and every time we came close to harvesting I had that same thought.”

“Well, that’s - that’s interesting, Captain,” Silver says. 

It suddenly occurs to Flint that Silver has probably never grown an aubergine in his life, let alone seen one on the vine. 

Fuck.

“Aubergine blossoms are lavender,” Flint says, taking Silver’s free hand in his own. “They’ve always been lavender. It was just that I couldn’t see it before. Do you understand?”

Silver doesn’t respond, staring down at their joined hands. 

“It was Thomas who first understood what it meant. I was too blind, too stubborn to see what was right in front of me.”

Silver looks up at Flint, a terrified sort of hope dawning on his face. “And what was that?”

“You gave me that color. That one, and so many others.”

Silver, ever hesitant to trust anything good, shakes his head. “That’s impossible.”

“What seems impossible to me is that I didn’t realize before how vivid the world became once you came to Nassau. Did you know mead has a color?”

His poor joke works; Silver lets out a wet, half-hearted chuckle. It’s fond, but not particularly confident.

“There’s no way you could know that. You could never be certain. I could never be certain that it was me who gave you that.”

“But Silver,” Flint reaches up and cups Silver’s cheeks in his hands. “Even if you haven’t given me mead, or aubergines, or any other small, wonderful color, it wouldn’t have made any difference. I loved you long before.”

Silver lets out a wounded, gutted noise, reaching for Flint and pulling him into a long overdue embrace. He buries his face in the crook of Flint’s neck and exhales a shuddering, sob of a breath when Flint threads his fingers through his curls in response. 

They’ve never truly held each other like this before, Flint realizes. For all the unspeakable fondness he’d had for Silver in those last months, he’d never once pulled Silver into his arms, felt their chests pressed close and warm. 

Flint leans back, just enough to press his lips to Silver’s. Silver stiffens, inhales sharply, like he’s still surprised Flint would want to kiss him. But then he softens, leans into the kiss, returning it with a tentative, gentle tenderness that breaks Flint’s heart. 

Silver pulls away, pressing their foreheads together. His hands fist convulsively into Flint’s shirt, as though he’s afraid that if they stop touching the other man might just vanish. Silver lets out a disbelieving laugh. “Two points in space at the same time.”

Flint chuckles himself, wiping away the tears still streaked across Silver’s cheeks. “I was always better at it than you.”

“You really want this? And your lord as well?”

“Thomas was the one who thought of it, remember?”

They stand there for a time, simply holding one another, until Flint hears Thomas walking up behind them. Silver’s eyes go wide, and he steps away from Flint, likely unsure of what Thomas will say when he sees them together.

“You don’t need to be afraid,” Flint says, taking his hand. 

“Indeed not,” Thomas agrees, laying a hand on Flint’s shoulder. “All I want, Mr. Silver, is for James to be happy. And it seems to me that he cannot be truly happy without both of us. Why would I keep you from James, when you are just as much a part of him as me?”

Silver opens his mouth to speak, but it seems as though for once his words have failed him. He looks at Flint, clearly at a loss - and well, it’s cute. A bewildered, flustered Silver is cute. Flint kisses him, simply because he can , now.

“You are mine, and I am yours. There is certainty in that. If you’d allow it, I would not be parted from you.”

Silver smiles, finally , and it’s like the sun breaking through the clouds after a storm.

“Don’t you know? I’d follow you anywhere.”