We Invented the Remix...Redux V

Title: Deeper Than the Seas (The Voodoo Child/Slight Return Remix)
Author: the_dala
Summary: Anamaria at world's end, and what's left after.
Fandom: Pirates of the Caribbean
Pairing: Anamaria/Will Turner, Jack Sparrow/Elizabeth Swann
Rating: NC-17
Disclaimer: pirates and their environs belong to Disney; remix title belongs to Jimi Hendrix; the story of Spider Marries Monkey's Daughter was transcribed by Martha Warren Beckwith and can be read here
Original story: Deeper Than the Seas by artaxastra
Spoilers: the official trailer for "At World's End," nothing beyond that
Notes: thanks to my lovely beta hannahrorlove



Deeper Than the Seas (The Voodoo Child/Slight Return Remix)



At first she thought it was the weather – a gradual rise in pressure waking her in her bunk, sending her out into the faint blue dawn. The watch looked at her like she’d run mad. None of them could feel it and there was nary a cloud on the horizon, but the air suddenly lightened just like when it rained.

As the sun climbed higher in the sky, its rays set her skin and the backs of her eyes to itching. Anamaria grit her teeth and told herself it was nothing. She took to her cabin at the noon hour despite its sweltering heat, in order to avoid snapping at her crew. She paced its narrow confines, sweating, while the slow, steady beat started up in her blood, her belly, her temples. There was no mistaking the call then. The scar on her left breast burned as it had years before, from the wound itself and then from the herbs in the poultice. She could still see the fine dark hands, free of any jewelry, soothing upon her aching flesh.

With a sigh, she sank loose-limbed onto her bunk and fumbled for the gris-gris under her pillow. “All right, Aunt,” she said softly, fingering the worn leather pouch. “You got my ear.” Still, the beckoning didn’t let up until she went up on deck to set a new course.

“That’s just like her,” Anamaria muttered, shading her eyes as she looked out to the horizon. “Meddlesome old bitch.”

They weren’t but ten hours’ sail away, which of course she must’ve known when she made the summons. Big Mike and Cristóbal stepped into the longboat beside their captain, asking only if the river ran shallow up ahead. She favored the one for his silent strength; the other for his quick wit and the gratitude he bore her for sparing his wife and child in the raid. She’d even put up some of her own gold to get them settled in San Agustín. If there was one thing Jack Sparrow had taught her as a captain, it was the value of a good second.

The boat slipped almost silently along the river, its disturbance of the dark waters drowned out by insect sounds and harsh cries from the unseen beasts along the banks. Big Mike didn’t voice a word of protest, but his nostrils flared when green points of light flashed amongst the trees. Once they passed a party with a lit candle, humming a funeral song. Anamaria waved to them, and they smiled to see her face once more. If she closed her eyes she could see her mother in their midst -- cotton dress rucked up to protect her skirts from the mud, hips swaying slightly to the tune, dark eyes cast up to catch the occasional star winking through the canopy. It was a fancy, not a memory – Mama had been too ill when she arrived here to go tramping about the swamps.

She was surprised to find another boat tied up at Tia Dalma’s tumbledown house, but somehow not at all surprised to lean over and find the familiar sparrow carved in its bow. The Pearl must be anchored in one of the other bays, hopefully not too far around the western spit – despite her misgivings about Jack Sparrow, she had no wish for him to run afoul of the Pelegostos again. Tia Dalma was waiting on the porch when they climbed the stairs.

“Aunt,” said Anamaria curtly, though the sight of Tia Dalma’s blackened smile and mess of hair calmed something that was usually anxious in her. “Why did you call me?”

“Anamaria, m’pet,” she purred, drawing her niece close and kissing her brow. Anamaria closed her eyes and inhaled the scent of herbs and smoke, heavy and acrid but familiar as the back of her own hand. She wasn’t really an aunt, of course; for all Anamaria knew, she wasn’t really human. But for nearly twenty years, this house with its collection of religious tools and mementos of a world Anamaria barely remembered had been what she thought of when she dared to think of home. Blood called to blood, and even if Tia Dalma wasn’t, Mama had been buried by her hands not two miles inland.

Gibbs stepped through the door, his face open and eager as he clasped her hand. “It’s good t’ see ye again, Ana.”

“Aye,” she said with a reluctant smile. Gibbs had always been kind to her, even if he disapproved of her sex. “Now where is that rogue Jack? I found that hole below the waterline as soon as we set sail, and I’ve a mind to box his ears for not tellin’ me about it.”

He dropped her hand and his gaze immediately, grief distorting his expression.

“Chile,” said Tia Dalma softly, spreading her fingers on Anamaria’s back, “why don’ you come inside an’ learn de answers ye seek.”

She fought hard, but in the end could not refuse her – could not refuse them. Not the men who’d stuck by Jack when his famous luck had run out; not the two young people who’d such a talent for causing a ruckus. Oh, she remembered them well, and yet they weren’t quite the same pair who’d taken the Interceptor’s quarterdeck and saved Jack from the hanging he’d so richly deserved.

A year had taken Will Turner from a rash and callow youth to this strange, somber man who kept his distance from the lady and twisted an old dagger in his hands. And this was not the sugar-spun, lightning-quick governor’s brat questing to rescue her beau. The form was the same, but the trappings...

Elizabeth Swann was tanned from long days at sea, and though the men’s clothing suited her, both it and she were badly in need of a wash. And there was something less tangible that had changed too, a bleak depth in her eyes, a bitter set to her mouth. She was even quieter than Turner.

The loudest protest Anamaria voiced was against Barbossa. She could be called brave but not fearless, largely because she wasn’t an idiot. And she feared Barbossa, as only fools would not. But Tia Dalma was no fool, and when she said that Barbossa was beholden to her for the gift of his life, bound to carry out the task of bringing Jack Sparrow back on pain of a fate worse than death, Anamaria had no choice but to believe her.

They needed a ship, and she had one. The Swift was small and well-weathered, but she was reasonably fast and eminently reliable. She was all Anamaria had in the world, and she made both Tia Dalma and Barbossa sign the articles in blood that no one would take the ship from her once they had the Black Pearl back from the depths. The rest of the crew vouched for Jack.

When they had at last settled matters, there were only a few hours of dark left. Barbossa was keen on leaving with the dawn tide, but for now he disappeared up the stairs. Anamaria raised an eyebrow at Tia Dalma, who ignored her thoroughly. The other men stretched out in various uncomfortable-looking spots on the floor. Elizabeth was perched on a bench, staring at her hands in her lap. She didn’t seem to be anywhere near sleep. Will came to light at her side, hesitating like he wanted to speak, but all he did was touch her shoulder. Anamaria, watching out of the corner of her eye while she stroked Erzulie’s cool scales, noted that the girl raised eyes full of tears, but did not reach for him and quickly looked away again. His hand fell away and curled into a fist, and then he swept out the back doorway onto the porch. Though hers was not a curious nature, Anamaria wondered what had come between them. Had the lass been so foolish as to fall after Jack? She’d mourn harder when they got him back, if so.

“Come away,” said Tia Dalma, clicking her teeth as she’d done to chide Anamaria as a child. “I’m t’ lead de dance.”

“But Aunt, it’s been so long –” She wasn’t sure she had the energy or concentration to begin, nor the courage to let it go when necessary.

Tia Dalma looped a straw bag over her arm and snapped her fingers. “The lwa know how long it been, an’ how long ye got t’ go now.”

Anamaria made a face when the older woman’s back was turned, but she was right to seek whatever aid this journey might need.

“See ye don’ burn me house down,” Tia Dalma instructed the fat, balding bloke who was still awake. Then she extended her arm toward Elizabeth, fingers outstretched, never more confident than in what she asked for being given. “G’wan, m’ija. Ye watch.”

Startled, Elizabeth bit her lip and followed, their silent shadow squelching in the black riverbank muck.



If she’d known how damned long they’d be at sea, she might have thought twice before allowing her beloved Swift to be commandeered. At least she had fewer problems with Barbossa than she’d expected; he was the only one who knew their bearings, but in all other matters he deferred to her as captain. If this fostered resentment, he hid it quite well. Mostly he enjoyed needling everyone about whatever subject made them most uncomfortable. Will and Elizabeth eased his way considerably as they made no pretense toward behaving like childhood sweethearts, much less nearly man and wife.

One morning, after repeated insinuations about Elizabeth’s honor and Will’s ability to satisfy a woman, Elizabeth’s patience cracked like the floes of ice through which Anamaria was carefully navigating.

“Say it again!” She’d flung off the heavy rug from her shoulders and stood balanced like a born fighter, sword in hand. “Go on, call me a whore.”

Barbossa, a few paces away, cocked his head with interest. “Yer words, darlin’, not mine. I’d ne’er employ such a crude tongue before a lady.” Elizabeth’s lips thinned and for a moment Anamaria feared she’d strike.

“Hold!” she shouted, taking as much attention from the wheel as she dared. “Both ‘f you, hold!” To Cristóbal, who had appeared at her side like a ghost, she muttered, “Keep ‘em civil.” He nodded and skipped down the quarterdeck steps while she hunched into her coat and glowered at the fools.

Before he could reach the approaching fracas, Will had stepped to Elizabeth’s side. He didn’t draw, but a hand on his sword hilt was threat enough.

“Leave her alone, Barbossa,” Will bit out, sounding more exasperated than angry.

“An’ now here’s yer swain t’ defend ye,” Barbossa observed in amusement, leaning casually against the mainmast. “Must rankle yer pride a bit, aye?”

Elizabeth’s voice was deadly cool and her stance still firm. “No more than knowing you’ve been brought back from the dead as a glorified compass must rankle yours.” The corner of Will’s mouth twitched at this, but most of the nasty humor left Barbossa’s eyes to be replaced by mere nastiness.

“Párelo! Stop this!” Cristóbal snapped, waving his hand at Elizabeth’s sword. “You kill him, you do not get your capitán back, and my capitán will make me scrub the blood out of the deck.”

Anamaria chuckled to herself, her hands relaxing a bit on the wheel’s spokes. She wished she had ten of Cristóbal sometimes. “He speaks the truth,” she called down to them.

“Aye aye, cap’n,” said Barbossa with a mocking bow. His need to retort, goad Elizabeth into stabbing him, or perhaps draw his own weapon had been spared by Cristóbal’s attention to Elizabeth’s insubordination. He slunk away into the hold, which was at least out of the freezing wind.

Elizabeth scowled fiercely while she sheathed her sword. It was the most spirit she’d shown in a month, and perhaps that was what lent Will courage.

“Here,” he offered, bending down to pick up the fallen rug. Elizabeth had started to shiver already, but she reached for it with obvious hesitation. When their hands touched, a swift expression of pain and longing twisted the weariness on her face. Will wasn’t facing the helm, but Anamaria could well imagine his tentative, hopeful smile. For a moment she thought – but no, this moment passed like every other between them. He let go and walked away, leaving Elizabeth to wrap her arms around herself and bow her head.

That much of it was plain to see. He was waiting for her, out of courtesy that was likely misplaced and love that almost certainly was. And she needed the sort of man who’d come to her. How much of it was due to youth and how much to Jack Sparrow was difficult to tell without the third party in attendance. What could he have been up to, to leave the girl in this state? Anamaria knew him well enough, knew how he was with women thanks to Tia Dalma if not to her own experience, and she’d thought Elizabeth had more sense.

Later, in the cabin Anamaria had generously offered to share, she drew aside the sail curtain behind which Elizabeth always retreated. The girl glanced at her like she’d been expecting this, though they’d hardly spoken since setting off.

“Is it true what he says? ‘Bout you and Jack?” she asked quietly.

Elizabeth tucked her legs up in the hammock, wrapping her arms around her knees. She didn’t seem prepared to go on about the tortures of her heart or her loins, for which Anamaria was grateful; that was mainly why she’d never asked in the first place.

“Not in the way he thinks,” Elizabeth said at last, biting her lower lip as she measured her words carefully. “In others…” One slender shoulder lifted, helpless. “And I wonder, truly, which is worse?”



Not until weeks later did she have the chance to answer that question, and it was four days later still before Anamaria saw what she’d come up with. That night the wind was still and her crew quiet – they’d never seen unnatural things like the Pearls had, and the adventures of late had sobered them up remarkably. Barbossa had retreated to the Swift for reasons of his own, but fortunately he stayed below. Anamaria felt so restless that she accepted Jack’s invitation to come aboard and hear Ragetti play. The guitar, it seemed, had been one of the many shipboard possessions that resurfaced when she did.

“He plays a pretty tune,” Jack assured her, graciously offering his hand as she clambered up the side like a true sailor. She ignored it and hauled herself over the rail, studying him from beneath her lashes. There were still shadows behind his eyes, but he was jolly with rum and revelry, and it didn’t seem to be an act. She had been relieved and pleased to see him again, and she was more so now to see him nearly back to form. Tia Dalma would have wanted to know about where he’d been, what he’d seen, but Anamaria hoped he would never speak of it - at least not to her.

The first tunes Ragetti played weren’t pretty so much as loud, boisterous, and full of bawdy rhymes and gestures. Anamaria rolled her eyes at Pintel’s antics on the capstan and rebuffed his attempts to get her involved in the pantomime. He was lucky not to get her pistol involved in his innards, all things considered, but it was hardly the worst she’d faced as the sole woman in a crew of men.

Or one of two, at the moment. Elizabeth was sitting beside Ragetti on the main deck, her attention focused on the long fingers sliding along the strings and frets. It most assuredly was not focused on Jack, who was on the quarterdeck stairs going through the story about the mermaid wedding yet again; or on Will, who sat on the forward hatch cover and divided his brooding glances between the two of them. She supposed he had the right to a fair bout of brooding.

She wasn't at first sure about the extend of that right, not until the crowd began to thin out and Elizabeth asked, "Will you play that ballad, from...?" It was as shy as Anamaria had ever seen her, but before she'd finished speaking, Ragetti was already strumming the melody. Anamaria recognized it when he sang the first verse: the captain and the nobleman's fair daughter.

The nobleman’s fair daughter
Came down the narrow lane
Met with Captain Wedderburn
The keeper of the gate
“Now my pretty fair miss,
You mustn’t fall in love
But you and I in one bed must lie

“Roll me over next to the wall,” Anamaria sang softly, along with everyone still hanging about.

Elizabeth asked the questions six, her singing verse pretty and clear, if a bit thin. Jack came no nearer but she was looking straight at him, her eyes dark and speaking.

What is rounder than a ring?
What is higher than the trees?
What is worse than a woman’s curse?
What is deeper than the seas?

It made Anamaria nervous just to see her face so open and intent. Jack, on the other hand, met her eyes squarely, singing the answers with a grin and finesse, if a certain lack of talent.

Earth is rounder than a ring
Heaven is higher than the tress
The devil is worse than a woman’s curse
Love is deeper than the seas

Anamaria had seen that smile before – after he’d staked six months of plunder on a bluff and won, after he’d stood his ground against a formidable opponent and come out ahead due to sheer contrariness and luck. He was close to her aunt once, but he had never dared look at the woman like that. And Elizabeth drank it in like the sweetest wine.

Lark sings first
Thrush sings best
Earth’s where the dew falls
You and I in one bed must lie
Roll me over next to the wall

It was captivating, the intimacy shared between them with just a look and a tune. A part of Anamaria even thought it was indecent to be anywhere near them – not that they noticed. She certainly hoped Will had had the sense to make himself scarce. But he was still there, sitting on the edge of the circle of music. For a moment she thought perhaps he was as oblivious to the desire crackling between them like lightning as they were to everything else, including his pain.

He takes her by her lily-white hand
Leads her down the hall
Takes her by her slender waist
For fear that she might fall

He’d turned his head away. Young he might be, but he was not blind. Pity lay heavy in Anamaria’s breast.

Lays her on a bed of down
Without a doubt at all
He and she lie in one bed
Roll me over next to the wall

Anamaria repeated the last line in a murmur. Jack and Elizabeth were still locked in each other’s gaze, catching their breaths, as Will quietly made his way aft. He glanced up at the quarterdeck, but Cotton seemed quite steady and intent at the wheel, so he moved on until there was no more deck to pace. She nudged Marty’s head, which had fallen against her arm when he fell asleep, and followed.

“Still night,” she remarked, drawing up beside him as he leaned over the rail.

Will didn’t lift his eyes from the Pearl’s sluggish wake. “Too still. I could use a bit of action, frankly.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Anamaria said, pulling the leather thong from her hair to straighten it out.

She hadn’t meant to sound flip, but Will’s mouth twisted with bitterness. “Am I so obvious a fool as that?”

“I don’t believe anyone thinks you a fool,” said Anamaria carefully, brushing her hair over her shoulder with one hand. She did miss having Tia Dalma around to fuss with it sometimes. “Casualty of war, maybe.”

Will snorted at that, though he didn’t look any less melancholy.

Anamaria considered her approach. She could be tender and pet him like a lost puppy, which was not her nature; or she could lay it out plain in the hopes he’d waste less thought and energy dwelling on where he’d gone wrong. If he rankled at that, she’d know better what sort of man he was, and if it was worth her time to console him.

“Look, Turner, some things don’t take to the sea, and marriage is one of them,” she said flatly, propping her elbow on the rail to face him. “Maybe you’d’ve made a better go of it on land, or maybe you and she would’ve ended up living both your lives in misery. Maybe it’d be some other man ten years down the line, if not Jack. Wouldn’t you rather know now when the damage doesn’t have so much water behind it?”

“What would you know of it?” he demanded, straightening and leaning in close, hostility rising off him like waves of heat. She didn’t give an inch, though his eyes were dangerously dark. “The damage is –”

His anger faded with a quickness and he rubbed the back of his hand over his brow, sheepish. “I’m sorry.”

“No, you’ve every right to be angry,” she replied, raising her eyebrows. “Hate them if you like –”

“I couldn’t,” Will whispered, bending over again, head in his hands. “Even after all this, I can’t.”

She shrugged. “I would. At least for a time.”

Will sighed, gripping the rail with both hands and stretching back against it. He’d gotten his share of sun, but his skin was still silvered by the moonlight. Looking at the corded muscles of his arms, the strong lines of his back, the soft warmth of his brown eyes, the fullness of his mouth – it was difficult to see him as anyone’s cast-off. She didn’t like to think of how a hard life would mark up that body.

“I think we’ve had enough talk about my romantic misfortunes,” he said with a crooked grin. She guessed he didn’t realize how closely it resembled Jack’s, or else he wouldn’t have made it. “Would you be so good as to distract me, Captain?”

Anamaria pretended to consider refusing, though she was always pleased to be called by her title. After a moment she knelt on the deck, sitting back against her heels. “A story?” she suggested. “I don’t know so many as Jack, but mine aren’t so damned outrageous, either.”

Will dropped down beside her, sitting cross-legged. His eagerness was born from a wish to forget, but she welcomed it nonetheless. “What sort of story?”

“From Tia Dalma, and from Africa,” she said with solemn dignity, and his eyes widened appreciatively. She was tempted to adopt the accent and speech pattern in which she’d learned the tale, but felt too silly. It was ridiculous enough that she was telling a grown man one of her favorite bedtime stories without giving it a player’s chicanery.

“Spider wanted to marry Monkey’s daughter, but Monkey thought Spider was beneath him, and he only kept Spider’s company because he found Spider useful.”

Will’s straight brows lifted. “Oh, that doesn’t sound the least bit familiar.”

“Hush. Monkey went to see his friend Green-lizard to tell him of Spider’s cheek, laughing at the thought of Spider marrying his daughter. But Monkey didn’t want to insult Spider and turn him away, so he asked Green-Lizard how to get out of it. So Green-Lizard said, ‘I tell you what to do – you call her “Miss Nennan-kennen-wid-a-turn-down-gown” and say whoever can guess her name can marry her. Spider will never –”

“Sorry, wait – Miss Nenna-what?”

Anamaria slit her eyes at him, trying to decide if he was mocking her. But he looked genuinely perplexed, and parroted the name until he got it right. Still sounded absurd coming from his lips, but she suppressed a laugh out of respect for his pride.

“Now Green-Lizard went right around and said to Spider, “When they ask you Monkey-daughter’s name, you say…” She waved her hand.

“Miss Nennan-kennen-wid-a-turn-down-gown,” said Will obediently. “And did he marry her?”

“Aye, after none of the other suitors could name her. Monkey couldn’t do anything about it. But when Miss Nennan-kennan-wid-a-turn-down-gown had a baby, she left him with Spider while she went down to the pond to fish. So Spider sang a song to the baby, and when Monkey was walking by, he heard Spider singing. He shouted, ‘You took my daughter!’ and grabbed the baby away, and he killed Spider. But when he struck Spider, the baby fell out of his hands and died.”

Will frowned, subdued. He clearly hadn’t been expecting the story to turn out quite like that. “Oh.”

“So they say, never kill a spider, as whatever you have in hand will break.” Remembering that she was still holding the leather tie, she swept her hair back and tied it firm again.

He leaned back, lips pursed. “What happened to Monkey’s daughter, Miss…”

“The story doesn’t say,” Anamaria admitted. She’d forgotten how that had always disappointed her. “But I like t’ think she went off on her own after that, maybe became a fisherwoman. And Spider – Anansi – he’s in all the stories, he always manages to come back around.”

“From death?” Will realized what he’d said and laughed, shaking his head. “Never mind.” She’d never heard his laugh before, and found herself responding in kind.

They stayed up awhile longer, after all but the watch had turned in. Elizabeth and Jack were just below their feet, but thankfully Anamaria didn’t hear anything. She told Will a few more tales, a bit more about Tia Dalma and how Mama had come to her. Will explained the debt to his father, which was one she’d never have made, but at least it gave him something to concentrate on besides a broken heart. He also drew out the sword he’d forged and showed her a few passes with it; she was a good shot, but knew little about the art of swordplay beyond slashing the blade at an enemy you hadn’t managed to shoot.

When pale dawn light began to glow over the horizon, their yawns grew deeper and more frequent. Will sheathed his sword and planted his hands casually on his narrow hips.

“Well,” he said with a smile, “it’s been a finer night than it had any right to be. Thank you for waiting it out with me, Anamaria.”

She inclined her head; an hour ago she might have added, “My pleasure,” but the words died in the morning light. Will bounced on his toes, first toward her and then away, clearly wanting to touch her in some way but not knowing how to go about it. Anamaria bit her lip hard to hold back a grin. Oh, but he was a boy sometimes.

At last he reached out to clasp her arm, briefly and warmly, before hurrying down the hatch to his hammock. She did smile after him now, and when she looked up she met Ragetti’s curious eye. Anamaria felt her cheeks warm – she hadn’t even noticed the watch change. He’d never look at her like that if she’d been a man. Well, Jack might...

“Eye on the wheel,” she barked, and he immediately snapped to attention and stared into the far distance. Satisfied, she stretched out on the deck. She’d get back to her own bed in a bit, but for now she wanted to watch the last of the stars winking out of the sky.



Anamaria thought she’d seen the world’s end when they brought Jack Sparrow back from it, but she was wrong. The end of all things looked like the Swift going down with all of her men except Big Mike, who’d swung across to the East Indiaman at her side. It seemed so quick and quiet because she had been distracted, but she knew there must have been screams, panic, the groan of timber and the rush of water. Wielding her rusty blade more capably after a few weeks’ tutelage with Will and Elizabeth, she had only time to watch the end, when it was too late. After that, there was nothing left but to keep fighting.

Big Mike was good at that, and he was the one who set fire to the one dry keg of powder in the ship’s hold. It wasn’t enough to blast her out of the water, but it was enough to sink her, slowly so that Anamaria time to look in the captain’s eyes before she slit his throat, slowly enough for Big Mike to free a boat for the two of them. Some mad spirit with a sense of humor saw that the Black Pearl and the Flying Dutchman had drifted alongside by this point.

Anamaria paused before abandoning the sinking hulk, watching Jack Sparrow cross blades with Davy Jones high above on one of the Pearl’s spars. He had the chest under his arm, but the heart – the heart was with Will, who held it aloft and shouted something about his father. He stabbed at the red, pulsing thing and Jones shrieked, nearly toppling from his perch. Anamaria shuddered at the unearthly sound of it, letting Big Mike push the boat in the direction of the Pearl.

A grotesque half-man beside Will embraced him, then heaved himself over the side. Anamaria supposed he could swim to safety, fishy as he looked.

She couldn’t actually hear Jack Sparrow shouting, “Do it, Will!”, but she imagined she could, and in a flash of lightning she saw his mouth form the words. With his dagger stuck fast in it, Will hurled the heart into the sea.

Everything seemed to move very slowly from that moment, and at once Tia Dalma was crouching over her in the boat. Anamaria blinked water out of her eyes.

“Aunt?”

Tia Dalma touched her face with a smooth, dry palm. Her hands were always dry, Anamaria remembered, even when she’d been working with oils and plants all day.

“Best close yer eyes f’r this, m’ chile.” She fingered the gris-gris tied around Anamaria’s wrist.

“No,” said Anamaria rudely, trying to look around her at where the heart was still – still falling. And the boat wasn’t rocking, though the sea was quite rough, so rough she hadn’t been at all sure they’d make it the short distance to the Pearl.

Why the hell wasn’t the boat moving?

She stopped thinking about the boat when the heart completed its interminable journey and struck the water – except it didn’t, because the water parted beneath it. The heart fell, still far too slowly, into a growing chasm as the sea churned around it in a black-green whirlpool. It would have been terrifying in any other circumstances, for it looked exactly the lairs of the sea monsters she’d heard Greek sailors talk of. But the boat still wasn’t moving, and everything was so sluggish and lazy, including the swirling water; mostly she just thought it weirdly beautiful.

It fell, and it fell, and though she shouldn’t have been able to, she saw when it hit the sandy ocean floor. It cracked just wide enough for the heart to slip through and then the earth beneath the waters sealed itself up. Water began to rush back into the eye of the whirlpool, and suddenly she was looking into the depths of Tia Dalma’s dark eyes and not the whirlpool at all.

“What – what...,"she breathed, thoroughly spooked and perplexed.

Tia Dalma’s smile was full of secrets as it always had been. Anamaria had tried to get at them as a child, but she knew better now.

“I’m goin’ someplace dry, querida. Ye’ll see me ‘gin. Look t’ yon man.”

Turning to Big Mike, Anamaria saw that he’d shut his eyes tight, probably when Tia Dalma had said to. She had that kind of effect on people, especially men. Anamaria wanted to scold her for frightening him, but when she looked back, the woman was gone as if she’d never been.

The boat lurched as Anamaria leaned over the side. Big Mike opened his eyes and grabbed for her, shouting in alarm. There was no splash, no body sinking through the dark water. Anamaria screamed, but it was swallowed up by the high, eerie moan of the sea as it foamed and swirled around the Flying Dutchman, swallowing the ship beneath the waves.

Anamaria had only ever fainted once – in a sugar cane field on a brutal Caribbean day. She had been five and she barely remembered it. Mama took her and ran that evening, eventually ending up at Tia Dalma’s feet.

As the boat slapped up against the Pearl’s hull and Big Mike cradled her in his huge arms, she fainted for the second time in her life.



There was no secondary mate’s cabin aboard the Black Pearl, so Anamaria shut herself up in the tiny, stinking sick bay. It held one swinging cot, an array of questionable instruments, and now a woman who spoke to everyone with an acid tongue. She got the most pleasure out of lashing Jack, who was more patient than Elizabeth and Marty, but less so than Gibbs or Cotton. Big Mike was ordinarily composed of nothing but patience and calm, but the day she ridiculed the purple birthmark covering three-quarters of his face was the day she went too far. The rest of his visible skin turned starkly white, and when she demanded that he leave, he did so and didn’t come back.

Will brought her food and drink after that, ignoring her cruel questions about the sleeping arrangements in the captain’s cabin. Sometimes he even answered them, with muscles in his jaw clenching as he spoke in the sort of polite voice one used with crabby older relatives. He asked her several times a day if she wouldn’t come walk on deck with him for a bit; the sun and the fresh air would do her good.

“I get my air when I have t’ take a piss,” she snapped. “Finally getting tired of watching Jack tup your missus while all’s you have is your good hand?”

He tucked his left hand with its two missing fingers behind his back, and she knew she’d scored a hit. The victory filled her with as much sickness as satisfaction.

“If it bothers you so,” said Will, his back stiff as a rod, “I’ll be sure to pick up a glove next time we’re in port.” He gathered up the wooden bowl of fish stew she’d barely picked at and turned on his heel.

“Wait,” Anamaria burst out. Will looked back over his shoulder, eyes storming. Anamaria wilted a bit under the fierceness of his glare, but she crooked her fingers at him. “Let me see it.”

He hesitated, clearly wanting to leave, but settled gingerly on the edge of the cot. The bandage on his hand was inexpert but sufficient. She unwound it as gently as she could, and he didn’t wince. “Who dresses it?”

“Elizabeth,” he said quietly, watching her unwind the gauze. “Jack directed her at first – he knows wounds fairly well – but she’s good enough on her own now.”

Anamaria nodded; it was healing cleanly, though the stumps still looked raw. In truth, it was a miracle he hadn’t lost the hand entirely. She wished she’d picked up more of Tia Dalma’s herb lore, as she had wished whenever one of her men got sick or injured. “Does it pain you?”

“Not as much now. It’s gotten better.” Her hands were restless, plucking at the bandage, and he covered them with his own whole hand. “Anamaria. It gets better.”

She met his frank gaze for an instant, then hurriedly looked away from the compassion and kindness in his brown eyes. At the edge of her vision, she saw him cock his head.

“Will you walk with me, now?”

He was nothing if not persistent. For seven days she left her self-imposed exile for a half-hour or so, shading her eyes from the sun like an invalid. Will walked beside her. He never offered his arm and she never took it, but she knew that was what he was there for. She made a point of finishing her meals as well, brandishing her empty dish in his smirking face. Already she was beginning to fill in the hollows that had formed under her eyes, around her collarbone, at her hips.

On the seventh night she dreamed of the plantation, drenched in the cold sweat of a fear that had owned her for twenty-two years. She had forgotten the details of the overseer’s face, but she had seen him in so many other faces over the years. For a long time after Mama died, she would hide in Tia Dalma’s trunk whenever the rare white man came seeking her aid. That was how she had met Jack Sparrow; canny creature that he was, he’d sensed her watching him through the lock and routed her from her hiding place.

But he’d made her giggle then, and that wasn’t what she dreamed. Instead she dreamed of the looming overseer tucking her into that trunk, locking her away like Davy Jones’ dead heart. No matter how she screamed threats, prayed, and finally begged, he only laughed. Sometimes it was Barbossa’s unpleasant snicker, now and then Jack’s self-impressed chuckle, and just before she woke it was Will’s soft, surprised laughter.

“What is it you want?” she hissed when he came to see her the next morning. Will blinked, confused, then ducked as she threw her boot at his head. “Y’want to swive me? Take a little black slavegirl – a vodou princess all your very own?” He came closer and she pulled the knife from under her pillow.

“No! For God’s sake, Ana –” She slashed at him and he caught her wrist. With her free hand she grabbed for his hair, making him yelp. He stumbled, pressing her back against the swinging cot. This was what she’d wanted – to know if she was right. The hardness pressing against her belly was answer enough.

In her darker nighttime thoughts she’d made plans for the knife, but now that he was so close she could do nothing but breathe. Though Will’s cheeks reddened, he met her eyes squarely, with something of a challenge. Now that she knew, what was she going to do about it?

The fight went out of her. She’d never really meant it in the first place, not for him. She knew exactly what she wanted to do to him, and it coincided with what, she felt, he’d needed for a long, long time.

“All right, I desire you,” said Will, his voice a low, tortured rumble. His bandaged hand flexed on her upper arm, but otherwise he kept perfectly still. “I never wanted to, and I’m sorry if I’ve caused you any –”

“Shut up,” said Anamaria, and dove at his mouth.

He kissed her gently for a few seconds, and she understood his care but didn’t want it. Hopping onto the cot, she pulled him close and wrapped her legs around his waist. To her delight his kiss grew deeper, more desperate. Most sailors kissed a woman like they wanted to drown in her, and Will had become a sailor through and through.

She pulled at his shirt and he stripped it off, then awkwardly levered himself up beside her. When she ran her hands down his back, she found the hard, well-formed muscles she’d so admired – along with a series of raised stripes. An involuntary shiver went through his body and he dropped his face onto her neck.

“The Dutchman,” he muttered by way of explanation, his breath hot against her skin.

It was hateful that he’d suffered, but she found that she appreciated how his trials had marked him after all. She stroked the lash marks, took his right hand and put it inside her shirt, pressing his fingers to the ugly scar at the top of her left breast.

“Hurts t’ swing that arm sometimes,” she said. Will pursed his lips in anger at whoever had done it, then pulled the fabric aside and pressed them against the damaged flesh. His hand roamed to the side, cupping her other breast, his callused palm rough against her skin. She drew in a sharp breath as he sucked at one nipple and tweaked the other. When she twisted beneath him to rub her knee against his cock, he lost his concentration and stopped.

Anamaria stared at the boards above the cot.

“You never have, eh?”

Will raised his head to look sideways at her, breathless. “No.” As if to prove his competence, he reached down to fumble at the fastenings of her breeches.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” she moaned, batting him away and rolling him over. Virgins were usually more trouble than they were worth.

Will looked up at her with one eyebrow raised, fitting his hands to her hips. “I though that was the idea.”

Anamaria snorted a laugh, an ungainly noise that nonetheless made Will grin. She pulled her shirt over her head, stretching a bit, letting him admire her firm breasts and dark peaked nipples. The mirth left his face entirely and he tugged her down to kiss her. She rolled her tongue in his mouth as she ground her hips against him, and he responded to both beautifully. His hands skimmed down her ribs, the injured one a bit lighter. He went for her breeches again and she helped, pushing them down her thighs. Boldy Will rifled his fingers through her curls, then slid them along the folds of her cunny. He seemed fascinated by the slick softness, if unsure about quite what to do.

“Is this right?” he wanted to know, voice husky. “If you’ll show me…”

Good boy, she thought, glad that at least she wouldn’t have to break him of any bad habits. She took his wrist and made him press harder, at the apex where all her nerves were centered.

Will proved a quick study. She leaned on his shoulders and rocked her hips against his hand, two fingers sliding easily inside her. He was biting his lip, entirely focused on learning her body, and his eyelids fluttered with surprised pleasure when she reached down to stroke the outline of his cock.

“Please,” he whispered, brow creased with strain. His breeches came down more easily than hers. She sat back, liking the size and weight of him in her hand. Will’s touches grew more erratic as she pulled on his cock, his hips rising off the bed. Oh, he’d waited long enough; she didn’t have the heart to drag it out any longer. Straddling him more comfortably, she leaned down and guided him into her.

Gripping her hips hard, Will let out a low groan. Grinning fiercly, Anamaria moved atop him and set a fairly easy pace, knowing it would be a trick to keep him from spending too soon. Will grunted and pushed against her, kissing her with a hot, open mouth. She spread her hands on his broad chest, brushed her knuckles over his nipples.

“Oh God – Anamaria – I’m sorry, I –” He moaned and thrust too quickly, out of rhythm. She was having far too good a time to give him up so easily, however. With a sigh, she balanced on her knees and reached down between their bodies. Will whimpered and closed his eyes as she circled the base of his cock with her thumb and middle finger and squeezed.

“What –”

“Givin’ us a moment,” she explained, kissing the confused ‘o’ of his lips. His toes curled and he squirmed, but in seconds his pulse had slowed a bit and the hazy lust cleared from his eyes. He caressed her cheek, her neck, down her torso to her navel, seemingly entranced by the sight of his pale fingertips against her brown skin. When he touched her cunny again, with a great deal more assurance, she deemed it time to continue.

At her urging he kept his hand there, pressing his blunt fingers against her as she rode him, and it didn’t take much before she was shaking apart, hissing out curses and falling against his chest. He said her name sweetly, fondly, and kissed her hair. He started to speed up again and this time she was content to let him finish, relishing a sense of triumph as he came with a harsh cry. Slumped over his shuddering body, she gave thanks to Tia Dalma, wherever she had gone, for the protective charms hidden in the gris-gris. Will clearly didn’t know any better, and she doubted even Jack knew about that little trick. Maybe one day she’d tell him.

“Oh,” Will breathed. She placed her palm on his chest, at the hollow of his throat. “That – that was –”

“Aye,” Anamaria agreed, trying to stretch her arm behind her head and accidentally elbowing him in the nose. They were pressed close in the tiny bunk, much too close now that the sweat was drying. She turned away from him, peeling the blanket and remnants of clothing from her sticky body.

Will didn’t seem to notice or mind. His arm dropped over her ribs and he kissed her shoulder. She made a face which he couldn’t see, but let the offending hot limb remain.

“Still want t’ take your walk?”

He pulled the heavy weight of her hair off her neck, twisting it out of the way. “Not just now.”

She was quiet a moment, adjusting to the feeling of his soft, languid kisses and deciding she liked it, even it was too bloody hot. Then she said bluntly, “You aren’t in love with me, are you?”

Will paused, his fingertips rubbing concentric circles halfway down her spine. She didn’t care if she’d hurt him; that might be the root of a problem she wasn’t about to adopt.

“No,” he said at last. He pressed his cheek between her shoulderblades, his stubble rasping her skin. “I don't believe so. This isn’t about – substitution. I don’t quite know what it is.”

She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. That was all right, then. But just in case –

“Because you know I won’t be owned. I’ll never be a wife, and I can’t make you any promises of that kind.”

“I know,” he replied. “I would not ask them of you.”

She turned around to face him, tracing the line of his jaw. “Elizabeth wounded you, but someday you’ll recover. Or you might tire of the sea – you’ve a useful skill, you’d have no trouble finding work as a smith.”

“Anamaria,” he said, kissing the bridge of her nose, “if you want to kick me out of your bed, you could simply say so.”

“I don’t.” His hand had found its way back to her breast, and she flexed her calves against his as he rubbed her nipple with his thumb. She took back everything cruel thing she’d ever said about virgins. “I really don’t. But I need you to understand the way things are.”

“Then stop trying to explain them,” he suggested. “And just...let them be.”

Even tangled and dampened by sweat, his brown curls were silky between the pads of her fingers. “I've not been so good at that in the past,” she admitted grudgingly, smiling as he rubbed his face into her touch like a cat.

“Neither have I,” Will said. He rolled her over under him, mindful of his bad hand. His weight wasn’t a burden but a comfort, and she tightened her arms around him to return it. “But we could try it together.”

She carded her fingers through his hair and kissed him, tasting the sea and a faint hint of steel on his lips. Elizabeth hadn’t the slightest idea of what she was missing. Of course she might tire of Jack in time, or he of her. Perhaps one or both of them would come seeking the young man they’d let slip away into her arms. There were glances Jack sent Will’s way from time to time, glances Will couldn’t read but which were plain enough to Anamaria. And there would always be that bond between Will and Elizabeth, from childhood on, which they could never see or break.

Tia Dalma could do the first and might have considered attempting the second, out of curiosity. Anamaria wasn’t sure if she herself would have helped or hindered. She also didn’t know how long she would be able to last under another man’s command, without her own helm and bearing, no matter how courteous he was. But she did know there might come a day for regret and reckoning, for all of them.

But it wasn’t in this bed, at this moment – not when Will was sliding down her body to press his warm mouth wherever he could reach. For his sake, she hoped it wasn’t for a long, long time.

And, she allowed, smiling down at his ruffled brown head, perhaps a bit for her own sake as well.