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Blackbeard lay stretched out on the cabin’s bed against the windows, his chest rising and falling, black grease streaked across his eyes. Stede sat in a chair pulled up to the bedside, watching each breath he took. He pulled back the sheet slowly, gently, exposing Blackbeard’s bare chest, shiny with sweat. The blood on his bandages had dried and faded to a dark rust-brown, which meant his wound had stopped bleeding. Good.
Stede had seen more blood in the past year than he had in all his years as a boy at his father’s butcher block. He’d learned how to wash blood out of fabric, how to stop bleeding, even how to stitch up stabs or slices that wouldn’t heal on their own (if Frenchie or Wee John weren’t around; they were better at it than he was).
He hadn’t let Frenchie or Wee John near Blackbeard’s shoulder, though. Stede took care of that himself. He’d put the hole there with his own sword, so it was only right that he take responsibility for mending it. Blackbeard didn’t look at him once the whole time, only grit his teeth, turned his head away, and took a swig from a filthy, half-empty bottle now and then until the pain and the rum overtook him and his eyes finally fluttered closed. Stede’s left hand dripped blood the whole time, shedding large, red drops through the hastily-wrapped cloth around it, but he wouldn’t let anyone tend to him until he had finished with Blackbeard’s shoulder, washed it, and re-wrapped it. Only then did he call for Frenchie, and he didn’t make a sound as his crewmate cleaned and bandaged the hole through his palm with his deft musician’s fingers.
Blackbeard’s dagger had made the hole. It had pinned his hand to the rail of the ship for a moment until Stede himself yanked it out and cast it aside. He could distinctly remember the clatter it made on the deck in the silence, and he could remember the horrified looks on the faces of his crew--Black Pete, Jim, Buttons, all of them--but he couldn’t remember what he had shouted at Blackbeard as he did it. They had both shouted a lot of things this morning, but he couldn’t… he couldn’t quite remember what they were. They weren’t important, none of it was important. He was here now, and Blackbeard was here, and somewhere… somewhere, he desperately hoped, Ed was here, too. He had to be. Stede had come all this way, fought his way through storms, the English navy, near-starvation, and all the rest, to find Ed.
But he hadn’t found Ed. There wasn’t a trace of him anywhere on The Revenge. There was hardly a trace of anyone on the ship. It was so empty. The crew was absolute bare bones, just Izzy Hands, Fang and Ivan, poor Jim, Frenchie, and a few new faces they must have picked up somewhere, snarling, evil faces that only ever grinned in battle lust, never in joy. The cabin that once was his was empty, too. All his books, his trinkets, his fine furniture, even his clothes, all gone. (He hadn’t checked the secret closet yet; he couldn’t bring himself to.) But none of that mattered, either.
“Ed,” Stede whispered, hardly a breath. He couldn’t help it--he reached out and lay his hand over Blackbeard’s hand where it rested on his stomach.
Blackbeard stirred. Stede quickly removed his hand and sat up straight, holding his breath. He watched as Blackbeard winced, moaned, and sighed. His eyes didn’t open, but he moved his right hand over the side of the mattress, and his fingertips slid into the gap between the mattress and the frame. Eyes squinted against the pain in his left shoulder, he seemed to be searching for something with his fingertips, and then he drew his hand up, dragging a ragged scrap of red cloth out of the gap and crushing it into his fist. Just before it all but disappeared, Stede caught a glimpse of threads that had once been white, and some that used to be green, shaping the petals of a flower. His dressing gown! It was hidden now in Blackbeard’s fist, but Stede knew that he must have cut the square from his dressing gown before he got rid of it, along with all the rest of Stede’s things.
Stede’s heart was hammering in his chest, but Blackbeard merely settled back to sleep, the hand clutching the fabric drawn up to rest against his throat, his other hand still curled on his belly. Stede watched him as his face now and then contorted in pain, or with nightmares, or both. The smooth cheeks and jaw that Stede last remembered were now covered with a couple of inches of gray and black beard. He couldn’t decide if that made Blackbeard look more or less like himself.
Eventually, the humid warmth of the room, the throbbing in his hand, and the exhaustion of the day (weeks, months) became too much. Slowly, Stede’s eyes drooped and closed, his chin sank to his chest, and he slept as well. There would be time enough for explanations and apologies when they woke.