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Is home a place, or can it be a person?
Ed's mum was his home, his first and last.
He’s barely set foot on land since she passed, knew that their people were seafarers and that he needed nothing more than the stars over his head to keep him company. He doesn’t know all the customs, the songs and symbols. But he chased it, when he first had his own ship. Met a handful others from that distant land; was gifted a carved green jewel by one bloke, watched breathless as a small crew danced before a raid, their eyes wide and tongues extended, feet and palms drumming steadily. Once he'd found an artist, she'd used a comb and hammer, and soot instead of ink. Reverent markings of his grief and curling lines like unfurling fronds to tell his history.
There's a handful of words, a few phrases he's learned, from the artist and others like her. Only the one word from his mum. But she spoke English with the same cadence; like a secret pride, a subtle protest.
Ed carries that with him, in the way he speaks, the words on his tongue dipping and weaving where the other voices don’t. Of course, it marks him as an outsider, and at times it's an effort not to slip into the tone of those around him, clip his vowels and polish his words into proper ones, like his dad demanded. But he'll always be different, at a glance even, to them, so he makes sure to keep that precious lilt of his mother's voice with him.
There's a bloke in his crew, from a different people, but the same island as his mum. Ed hears the song of his voice sometimes, when it carries on a calm night into his cabin. It's familiar and it hurts. When he was younger he sought out that accent, asked around at ports. Chased the easy inflection and scouted out others who looked a bit like him. But that was years ago and it's different now; a captain isn't friendly with his crew, even when they sound like family, like the place that he belongs.
So when he first hears Stede speak, it's a shock. It's like hearing a forgotten nursery rhyme, an old tune from long ago. And his accent has been ironed over with a British one, but the edges still furl over into something warm and familiar and enchanting.
Something like home.
Their house was never a home and his mum rarely used to speak about their ancestors or the place from where they came. But when she did, it was always, always prefaced; not a word to your father. Like he'd do anything other than keep his head down and bite his tongue when the old man stumbled in. Like he had anything other than hisses and snarls trapped in his throat. But when his father barked questions, Ed was expected to answer in a voice like his. Keep the melody of his mother's accent from his mouth; speak properly boy.
He did as he was told, for a short while.
But when they're alone, she tells him stories. From the bible, mostly, warnings and blessings. And sometimes, in those wonderful quiet moments it was just the two of them, his mum would offer him titbits about herself. Little scraps he still turns about in his mind like the swatch of silk though his fingers. Sometimes, like telling secrets, she'd say about her family, their home. About her own mother, a proud woman who wore her heritage in swirling black lines upon her face.
Once when they were cleaning at the estate, Ed came across a stone which seemed to hold a rainbow inside it. He held the thing in his little shaking hands, tapped it against dressing table edge as if the trapped colours might come out. His mum had scolded him, wrapped her hands around his to protect the precious item.
"Edward! You mustn't-"
She'd paused though, her hands around his and his around the stone and gold it was set in. She'd turned their hands against the morning light and both had gasped at the shifting colours.
"My mum had something similar," she'd told him, a bit breathless and teary which he only ever saw when she was hurt, so he'd wriggled from her hold and hugged her then. "Wasn't a rock, like this, was thinner, from a shell."
Ed had realised she was crying in a different way, so he dared to let her go, to look at her face and then back to the stone.
"Paua, she'd called it,"
And Ed thought then of power and wished it was something they could hold together like the stone, because surely power looked and felt like a hard solid thing with beautiful light and colours inside it. Like the lady of the house's diamond ring or the stained-glass windows at church.
And his mum gave him that pressed look then, like when they're in those cold hard pews. She chewed on her words before speaking them, testing to see if they were safe to share with him.
"My mum, she came from an old place, they had different ideas about the world, and -well I don't like to speak of it, boy- but where we have the one God, they had many."
He saw that fear flash across her face again so he had squeezed her. Him so little that his arms couldn't quite reach around her but he'd made every effort to hold her as carefully as they'd held that stone.
"When I asked my mum about that shell, the paua, she told me the God of the sea had made it- Edward you mustn't-"
"I won't tell him," he had promised her, meaning his dad and Father Mackay and God himself probably.
"The paua, it's a creature, she said it has a shell a bit like this," and his mum had taken his hand in hers and folded it open, her fingers around his and curving them both slightly. As if they were cupping water. "Like a snail, or cockles maybe. So this creature was soft and didn't have a shell, and the ocean God saw life was difficult for him."
Ed had wished they had those Gods of old watching over him and his mum. But his mother's face had been soft with her memories, so he thought of the grandmother he'd never meet and wondered if she watched over them instead.
His mum's tone had become clear and calm, like it was a story she told all the time. Maybe this was the way his grandmother had spoken, regal and knowing.
"The sea God decided to make the paua a special coat, choosing the deepest blue of his ocean, borrowing the rich green from his brother, the God of the forest. And from where the sky meets the sea, he chose the purple from a sunrise and the pink from sunset. He made this into a coat for the paua."
Ed had giggled at this, imagining some sloppy blob of a creature in a bright and shining coat. But if their God could do things like make the whole world and then flood it on a whim, why couldn't a gentler God make a beautiful thing for a dirty old sea critter to wear? Again he had wished for that God to see them.
"But when the other creatures saw the coat, they were jealous of how it shined, and it was fragile enough for them to take pieces away for themselves."
And Ed can understand that too, why should one slimy little thing get a bright, sparkling coat when others didn't. Why would God pick only it to show care and blessings to, and not those other creatures?
"God saw this, and he showed paua how to make the coat into a strong shell by adding more layers to it, blue and green, pink and purple. But because the other creatures envied the lovely colours, he covered the outside in grey and brown, so the paua could pretend to be a rock and be safe from those who wished to take his finery from him. So the paua was made strong, with secret colours to keep hidden."
His mum had squeezed his fingers and he'd held the stone so tight, as if he pressed hard enough it could become part of him.
"Let's go home," his mum had said, and pressed a kiss to his forehead. But he was already there.
It's not for lack of riches that he doesn't have his own fine things. He could wear spun gold, drape himself in rubies, emeralds and opals too. But he shrouds himself instead and he stays strong and safe.
God had been good to Stede Bonnet, or at least that's how it seemed at first to Ed. He'd been given coats of blue and green, silks the colours of dusk and dawn. He'd never had to hide among the shadows, to build a shell around himself. He was gullible but obliging and generous. He had other colours too, sunny orange marmalade and golden brandy and silver spoons. All of this he loved and yet he willingly, insistently, shared it with Ed.
And the more time Ed spends with him, the days turned to weeks, the more layers of colour he feels inside himself. Still secret and camouflaged to look at from the outside, but within he's glowing and lustrous.
God never gave Ed any colours, his mum did. The complexion he wears and the red silk he hides. She gave him an accent but not enough words about herself, about him.
Stede gives him compliments and praise without flattery. He offers him honesty and whimsy. Ed wraps himself in all of it and begins to feel safe.
Stede gives him a suit of purple and gold, the colours of sunrise. For a little while Ed thinks he can wear it, thinks it gives him power and poise. But his shell is fragile and they see him for who he really is.
Stede gives them more morning colours; warm licks of orange and yellow.
Ed already has the red of the dawn but he shares it that night, by accident. Stede doesn't scoff. He doesn't take it for his own. He folds it with reverence. He places it carefully, but conspicuously against Ed's chest.
Stede tells him he wears it well and Ed knows he's found his home.