Current mood:

Forlorn

Here, have some pirate fic.
Couldn't get this out of my head after we saw the mini-forge on Saturday. Unfinished, but I have to go home now. d-: Who knows if I'll ever touch it again.




Will Turner's Forge

The heart of a blacksmith is in fire and earth, and it abhors the sea.

They say for every truth somewhere there's a man what proves it false, and here's William Turner, smith born of water, lord and Captain of the ship as sails men's souls to world's end, the Dutchman - and I tell you it ain't a myth.

Though it's true enough William Turner's heart never went to sea. No man knows where it lay, on land somewhere, and maybe buried next to a mess of treasure, aye, all under guard of his lady love. Some say it were for love of her he carved it out, the Pirate King, as noble and terrible a lady as ever lived, and mayhap it were at first, but I know it were for love of craft he done it in the end.

Can ye see him there? He'll near forget he ever had a love before Calypso, ever knew aught but the sea and the damned, near mad with forgetting, then there he'll be, there in the great ship's hold, all grim muscle and sweat and sinew and long golden hair, laying into that anvil like a god, every bit as old Davy Jones used to lay into his organ. (Oh, aye, best not to forget there were a long, cruel time before we called it Will Turner's Locker!)

And you'd see, if you were there, the wide ocean might draw back a bit, might give quarter to William Turner's Forge and there'd be for an hour or a week a bit of earth and fire as ought not, a thousand leagues under the open sky. And far off somewhere that blacksmith's heart'll reach out through the dirt and sea and fire and iron, and for just an instant you might think Will Turner were a mortal man, admiring his work in a new sword, thrusting it to set in a steaming bucket as if to spear the very heart of the sea. You might hear him cry out "Elizabeth!", or mayhap "Jack!", or more an more as the years pass on you might just hear him cry. For it's a hard, cruel thing, it is, for a blacksmith's soul to love the sea.

And his crew, though they be damned, well, a damned man with a fine sword beats a saint without any day.

****************

Epilogue? Sequel? Completely unrelated?

You can't keep a Pirate King on land no more than a blacksmith's heart at sea, and so of course they meet, now and nonce, when time comes he'll claim one of her crew or those who cross her. And if you're lucky enough to be there, you might hear him cry through the clash of battle "Elizabeth, is it safe?" and her answer with a most fearsome laugh, hair streaming behind and eyes agleam, "Aye, Will, it is!"

Might be he smiles with pride on the lad who fights beside the King. Might be he frowns at the man who stands behind her. Might be, all the same, he's glad to see him there.