Promises

Tankard in hand, Douglas jumped down from the table draining it’s contents and tossing it aside. With the rum and the ale flowing and the carousing of the company, he scooped me up from my seat and slung me over his shoulder a great cry went up among them. In an instant my eyes locked with that of Mr. Glassepool and then with the tall and mysterious Moor as Douglas carted me upstairs. I thought only for an instant to resist, but the inner voice, the woman’s voice in me woulde not let me do so.

As we climbed to the upper chambers of the Inn, he did not strain with my weight, but toted me around as if I still was a spring wisp or a bag of feathers. I had forgotten how much taller and how much more petite I was compared to the bulk of him. To him I couldna weigh more than a sack of grain, I thought. He kicked open a door and with a growl he threwe me onto a waiting featherbed. Coming down on top of me pinning me downe. His eyes were dark and his meaning was clear.

My heart was as loud in my ears as the Vodou drums upon the Islands as he hovered o’er me! My hands rested on his shoulders and gingerly I let myself reach out and stroke his strong jawline. I coulde barely breathe, not because of his weight ‘pon me, but for the weight of what I was feeling. Within the blink of an eye, his lips were on mine, and mine answered his, I bit back a soft moan as my hands stroked his neck and his face. His fingers plunged and tangled in my hair. No words were spoken, and i’faith I can say that we did not need to speak. Douglas’ jaw parted and his tongue snaked between my slightly parted lips. My body obeyed the unspoken command and opened to him, my thighs aching sharply for him . Suddenly all of the years of searching and denial of my owne desires had come to rest in what little space that remained between us. That space was quickly becoming filled by his want and my need. All I could see, or be or think about at this moment was entangled and ensconced in him!

Douglas growled as he undid the laces of my bodice, my hands had already pulled the hem of his shirt up over his head and with a careless motion I flung it away. Douglas ground his hips into me and I could feel his tumescent conviction against my thigh and belly. I closed my eyes and savored the sensation of his lips and his stubbled chin dragging roughly across the sensitive underside of my breasts leaving me gasping aloud. My breath hthced and increased just as his did. With a deft move I rolled him with him until I was pressed on top of him. My knees on either side of his narrow hips, I leaned forward on my elbows and he looked up at me with those eyes. Ah the pain of it! By the Goddess, the beauty of him, ‘specially now woulde make a woman to weep!

“Fanny Fae…” he growled against my throat, “Fanny…”

“Hush….”I pressed my fingertips to his lips to silence him, for lovers often talk to much in the throes of passion.

I replaced my fingers with my lips, savoring the taste of him and letting each movement fling both our garments aside, and wash away each moment of paine that I had experienced. Furiously he crushed my mouth to his, both fo us enflamed by the physical reaction in the other. My own loins ground into his hoping to aleviate the burning sting that had been tormenting me. Everything was an urgency that melted and boiled like hot sugarcane in the boiling pots in the plantation fields, and only Douglas coulde quench it.

Unable to stand the torture, Douglas flung away the last bits of cloth that remained between us. With a sharp gasp, he rolled me beneath him and I drew myself around him, I could not breathe as our bodies met finally, his tongue plundering my mouth as surely as his manhood plundered me to height of my sex. Calloused hands slid down over the bare flesh of my waist and hips as he thrusted into me o’er and oer again. With a sharp cry I reached my culmination. As I did so he bit into my shoulder causing the entire world to careen out of control.

It was not until some moments later that we lay panting against each other, riding out the ebb of sensations that we had weathered. Lifting myself up slightly I look’d to him, running my fingertips over his nose and tracing lazy designs and sigils ‘pon his flesh.

So much was within me that I wanted to say, but coulde not. Our reunion had rendered me speechless, and perhaps it did for Douglas, too. I did not want to waste this moment, nor take it for granted, either. For once, it had felt as if I had come to that place which felt like home.

Douglas lay next to me as I dozed within the crook of his arm. He murmured softly, sometimes I could e hear his words clearly, and sometimes it felt like a dream. Always the softest of touches, the sweetest of caresses I felt to the point where it raised gooseflesh on my skin.

” Fanny… Fanny Fae… “he whispered, “I didn’t realize ’til now, how much I’ve missed ye, ” Douglas was thoughtful as he held me and we just basked in each other’s presence. I was in that place between waking and dream. Within moments I dozed, I let myself sink into the sensitivity of his warm touch, and just the presence of him. For the first time in many a year, I felt safe. Completely safe.

It was the pressing of a kiss onto my head that stirred me to a slow, lazy wakefulness. I kept my eyes closed and look’t at him through the dark fans of my lashes, “I’d forgotten how beautiful you are, ” he whispered in a barely audible tone, .”How perfect your body melds to me own… How long will you stay this time Fanny… Fanny Fae? ”

I did’na answer. The truth was, if it were up to me, I woulde choose to live and die at his side, always. But things were different now. Douglas was married, had family, children, and my owne body had lost the child, the one thing that tied me to him. I had to tell him what happened eventually, about how we were parted, what Barbossa had truly done. But now all that I coulde imagine or e’en think of now was the warmth and the love that I felt for him and I allowed myself to bask in it.

“I think I might be in love with you, Fanny Fae.” Douglas said quietly, whispering the words into my hair. “Damned if that doesn’t complicate things for both of us.”

What elation what joy his words made me feel! By the Goddess and all the Saints of Heaven and Earth, it was all that I coulde do not to spring up from where I was lying and fling my arms about him! I ne’er dreamed I woulde hear so quickly after our reunion what I had waited scores of years to hear, what I knewe in my heart, yet ne’er had confirmed: that Douglas Francis O’Riely did love me, and maybe he always had!

“When was it e’er not complicated for both of us, Douglas?” I turned to him with a slow sleepy smile. I reached out and ran a fingertip over his cheek and to his lips. He met my touch with a soft kiss. I felt my stomach pull and ache with want for him again, “As for me, you knowe in your heart that I have always loved you. I will be staying as long as ye want me to. E’en death will not sever us.”

“Ye mean ye weren’t asleep? ” Douglas’ eyebrows raised and he chuckled softly, “women’s trickery and chicanery! I knewe that ye couldn’t be trusted!”

“Nay, not where you are concerned! I would lie to Old Nick Himself if it meant that I got to spend a single moment with you.” I knew that he coulde not even begin to knowe how much I had been punished already by the lack of trust that had come between us, nor what punishments woulde lie ahead for both of us.

I puled myself up to lay against his broad chest, and held his arms close to my body. Lying skin to skin, I tolde him the tale, every intimate detail of how I had been trapped and held away in a remote location by Barbossa so that neither Douglas nor his crewe could find me. I told him the story about the young boy who had set me free, but by then it was too late, the Reaper had gone and with it Douglas had gone, of course. I allowed myself to cry at last when I told him of how I had born and buried our son. All the tears I had saved, all the pain and frustration that I had held so close, I coulde finally let lose, but i’faith, I knewe e’en as he stroked my hair and kissed my forehead and my tears away, that he would still always somewhat doubt.

“I ne’er left your side by choyce.” I said finally, “on the soul of our son, I woulde ne’er leave you by choyce and I ne’er will! By the Goddess, I was’na strong enough! Damn me to hell for not being strong enough to fight him!”

“”Do ye not realize what ye just done, Fanny?” Douglas asked, reaching out to stroke my hair and hold me close again. I let myself slip the comfort of his soothing touch,”Do ye not realize the oath ye swore and iffin ye break yer word, you and our son will burn for eternity!”

“Aye, I knowe. ” I answered, my eyes looked up at his, and I kissed his fingertips, pressing them into my face, “I woulde rather be burned in Hell for all of eternity than to be separated again from you!”

“Then God help us both, as I will most likely burn with ye!” he chuckled softly and kissed me again. By the threat of damnation and fire and condemnation we had begun our time together and so we had resumed it again by the same threat – only this time it had been spake by my very owne lips.

We both dressed, slowly, languishing in caresses and kisses again, even falling back to no clothes at all, loving each other all over again until at last we realized the entire day was getting away from us! Douglas e’en helped me into a new blue frock with lace at the neck and the cuffs of the sleeves. He moved aside my heavy tresses to plant a lingering kiss on the curve of my neck and with a soft groan and a tug of the hand we made our way to the stairway to go back into the tavern in the floor below.

The dark stairs creaked with our bodies’ weight and Douglas’ boots clopped behind my own softer footfalls, as we cleared the first landing, I heard a familiar voice, and my heart almost stopped in my chest. As we got closer, the raucous laughter and bluster I was filled with fear. I reached back and pulled Douglas’ hand from the small of my back to ‘round my middle, so that I would be girded up, shored against what I knewe that we would face upon reaching the main pub itself.

As we stood in the doorway, I looked across the room and saw the tall lanky figure of Captain Hector Barbossa. His jaundiced eyes met mine and a slow smile crossed his face. They say that some creatures smell feare, and i’faith I knewe he must have smelled mine.

Hell had come calling….