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"You could be more compassionate, Mr. Hands." Stede's voice is as uppity as ever. "You don't understand how hard it was to say goodbye to my children. I might never see them again now that I'm a proper pirate."
It had been an unconventional arrangement.
Cassian's wife had welcomed him with open arms and a dozen kisses on his still smooth cheeks. She'd forced a hearty meal down his throat and demanded he let her take his clothes to wash and mend.
"I asked him to bring you around." Rose is the picture of the perfect sailor's wife. She has plump cheeks, a sunburned nose, and a smile that lights up a room. She's scrappy and stubborn and loyal. Izzy can see why Cassian loves her.
"It must be… odd…." Izzy focuses on peeling sweet potatoes. Rose had shoved a knife and a bowl of them into his hands with no preamble.
He's barely seventeen and sitting in the home of his matelot and his matelot's wife. It feels like it should be uncomfortable, but… it isn't. Rose smiles at him. "Maybe a bit, yeah, but I know how it goes at sea." She turns back to the dough she's kneading. "My man comes back to me safe and sound, and I know I've got you to thank for that. The fact that you're buggering doesn't mean he loves me less." Maybe that is uncomfortable. She peeks back at him and laughs at the red-faced horror on his face. "What? Do you think I don't know the full story? You should read what that man sends me. I swear it would make a priest collapse."
She laughs, and Izzy can't help but laugh with her.
It had been the type of romance that lonely housewives would read about 300 years later and swoon. Cassian had swept him up and out of harm's way. He'd called him handsome and kissed him silly before running off to finish the job. Izzy had been barely fifteen, and by the time he was sixteen when Cassian declared him his matelot in front of the whole crew.
He hadn't learned about Rose until after. He'd felt a white-hot stab of jealous anger that his man would keep his marriage a secret but then… Cassian had kissed him and promised him that it wasn't a secret. His Rose was waiting for him to come home after years at sea. His heart ached for her any time he spoke her name.
Izzy had found it very romantic.
He's twenty when the twins start to call him papa. They'd been a welcomed surprise after a few years at sea. He and Cassian had changed captains and ships and earned new scars to show for it. The twins only saw Daddy and Papa coming home with hugs, kisses, and gifts.
He's twenty-two when Rose passes on. She's buried with a simple headstone marking her place with the babe who would never be born. The twins didn't understand where Mama had gone. They'd cried their little eyes out as he held them in his lap. Cassian didn't say anything for so, so long.
"I can't leave them like this."
The boys were sandwiched between them in a bed far too small for two grown men and chubby toddlers. It was meant to be Izzy's bed for when they stayed around. Cassian hadn't wanted to sleep in the bed he and Rose had once shared.
"You could hire on a nanny." Izzy knows where this is going. "Leave them with… with someone we can trust."
Izzy boards the Ranger a few weeks later. The twins wave excitedly. Cassian smiles.
He's twenty-three when he sees them again. The twins nearly bowl him over in excitement, and it's only Cassian's firm hug that keeps him upright. He regales them with stories of his new captain and how he will be named the first mate as soon as they set sail. Cassian tells him that he misses the sea. That he misses Izzy. His sons, however, will always come first.
"Papa!"
The twins are nearing six and are already far too tall for his liking. They have Rose's smile and Cassian's spirit. He likes to think that he's added a little something to the mix.
"Papa, we got you a present." Miles is the more vocal of the two, with Tobias preferring to let his brother communicate for both of them. They had called a meeting, and both looked very serious. He'd obediently met them outside under their favorite tree for this important meeting.
Tobias holds out his hand, still soft with baby fat, and reveals a cheap, half-tarnished ring. Miles holds up two rings that look similar enough at first glance.
"Daddy said that sailors need good luck charms!" He waved his arms around. "So we got this!"
Izzy takes the ring. There's a twinge in his chest. He loves these boys. "Rings? Did you use all of your pocket money?"
Miles nods solemnly. "They're super special rings." He hands his brother the third ring. Tobias smiles at their feet. "We thought," he whispers, "that if we got the same ring, we could be with you."
"Yeah! Daddy said he said! He said that if you touch your ring when you miss us, you'll feel all our good thoughts!" That sounds exactly like the kind of innocent lie Cassian would feed the boys.
The ring is too large for any of his fingers, so he elects to loop it onto his cravat as the boys watch. "Shall we test it?" He touches the ring with his bare hand. Of course, there's no magic, sparks, or anything but the feel of metal.
"Oh! I feel it!" He leans in and kisses them both on the forehead as they giggle. "I love it, boys. You're so very clever."
As First Mate Hands, he steps onto La Concorde, soon to be rechristened Queen Anne's Revenge. Captain Blackbeard stands at his side as his man and his children grow smaller and smaller.
They would be nearing forty. They'd still have those big smiles and bright eyes. They'd still call him Papa. They'd be tall enough to pick him up just like Cassian always did. They'd have wives and children. Tobias would be a scribe, he's sure. Miles would have tried to be a pirate like Papa and Daddy, but Cassian would have beaten the idea out of him. He would have been an excellent merchant.
"Shut the fuck up!"
Stede is silent for once in his fucking life.
He'd been twenty-five when he found their graves. A pox, the washerwoman had explained, had taken his family. It was sudden and painless, she had assured him.
"You chose to leave. You were able to give them a proper goodbye, Bonnet. Do not presume to know what I feel." There's a roaring in his ears. As has become a habit after nearly thirty years, he grips the ring looped onto his cravat until his knuckles turn white. It's soothing to feel the familiar stone. He can pretend that the magic is real. He can pretend that waiting for him is his matelot, hair graying and laugh lines around his, waiting for him. He can pretend that his sons are waiting for him to return with gifts and stories.
Bonnet, for what it's worth, has the sense to stay quiet for a long moment. "Will you tell me about them?"
The roaring in his ears quiets. "What?"
Bonnet looks at him with no pity. "Tell me about your family."
And so, despite himself, he does.