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It’s a raid like any other. A raid like the hundreds, maybe thousands of other raids that Israel Hands has fought his way through ever since he was way too young to fight. Smoke swirls in the breezy air, men’s shouts mingle with the creaking and grinding of the two ships pulled tight side by side. Blackbeard – his captain, his one true captain, brightest and best of them all – leads them and Izzy – loyal, loyal till the bitter end – follows.
Only this time, there’s another captain with them. Stede Bonnet, who returned a few weeks ago and laid his unfaithful, cowardly heart at Blackbeard’s feet. Stede Bonnet, who wept and begged and then swept Blackbeard off his feet. Stede Bonnet, who kissed Izzy’s captain right before this raid and Izzy had to watch Edward smile, soft and slow and sweet, before ordering them to board the merchant vessel.
And so this raid is like any other. But it will be Izzy’s last.
Izzy goads the crew they’re attacking, tries to get them riled up. They’re terrified out of their minds – they’ve seen the flag, they know – but Izzy is good, he’s so good, this is what he was born to do. If he survives, he’ll fulfil Blackbeard’s dream from all those months ago and retire. If he doesn’t, well. He’s had as good a run as anyone could’ve expected from him.
He tries insults, and gentle coaxing. He knocks Jim out of the way when they’re getting too clever. He already has a deep wound in his thigh that’s bleeding profusely, weakening him, dripping blood in his wake. If only these fucking cowards would find it in themselves to turn into the sharks he needs them to be.
Losing on purpose in hard work, but not harder than watching from the sidelines as your captain slips further and further away from you each day. It’s not harder than losing the person you’ve built your life around, watching them choose a worthless nothing of a man over you, over and over and over again. Not harder than being told by your own crew that your captain is the happiest they’ve ever seen him, when he’s doing everything you tried to protect him from. Losing on purpose is hard – but it’s not impossible. Eventually, Izzy is cornered, the rest of the fight moved somewhere else and three angry, sweaty, bloody men closing in on him with snarls on their lips. He spits at them and drives his sword through the tallest one, lodges the blade deep enough into the man’s soft, wet belly that he’s plausibly disarmed when the other two come for him.
“This isn’t your victory, by the way,” Izzy whispers to the man dying in his arms. ”I was brought down by Blackbeard. It was always going to be him, and only him.”
Then, the world goes up in smoke and noise and pain, and Izzy goes down with it, the warm blood-slick embrace of a man who wants him dead the last thing he knows.
xxx
When he wakes, someone is yelling at him. Izzy opens his eyes. The someone’s head is haloed with blond curls – an angel maybe?
“Fuck off,” Izzy says.
The angel slaps him across the face. Izzy’s brain feels liquid inside his skull and blood clings to his senses, its smell in his nose, its taste on his tongue.
“Ed’s worried sick. Get a grip, man!”
Ed doesn’t have to worry, Izzy thinks. Nothing stands in the way of his happiness now, Izzy has taken care of that. He slips back into darkness where he belongs, smiling.
xxx
The next time he wakes, someone is pouring something that feels like liquid fire into the wound on his thigh. The pain registers but his body doesn’t quite know how to react to it, so he stays silent and still.
“Truth be told,” a voice says, and Izzy smells cigarette smoke. “I didn’t think they’d actually believe me when I said I was a qualified surgeon. But the stitches look alright, don’t they? Better than the ones on my arm. Oh shit, you’re awake.”
Izzy blinks – a smokey figure hovers over him, a cigarette butt like a glowing eye threateningly close to his face – and then the excruciating pain surfaces properly and drags him back under.
xxx
The third time, a soft hand smoothes hair away from his face and a voice says, “I bet you’re staying unconscious out of pure spite, you horrid little bitch. Stede’s being unbearable, we’re not allowed to have any music or loud conversation after sunset so as not to disturb you.”
A wooden finger taps him on the nose.
“I’ve left you fresh water and bread. Eat up.”
Izzy waits until the door closes. When he opens his eyes, he’s… well, if this is hell then it’s expertly designed to be exactly the thing that would cause him the most agony. He’s in his tiny, windowless cabin aboard the Revenge, light filtering dimly through a lattice in the ceiling. A cup and a plate sit by the bed. Izzy reaches for the water and immediately cries out, a feeling like he's being stabbed in his upper body forcibly pinning him to the mattress. Something is broken, maybe an arm or some ribs, the pain is so all-encompassing that it’s hard to tell. His whole body feels withered and bloated with it, and without a doubt he’s alive.
Bonnet finds him like that, sweaty with pain and sobbing noiselessly, too spent to actually produce any tears and too injured to reach the cup on the floor.
“So you’re not dead,” Bonnet says.
Izzy draws in a shaky, rattling breath. He tries to say, no shit, but nothing comes out. His throat feels like sand and salt. He wonders if Bonnet has come to finish the job and then notices the man’s not carrying any weapons. What kind of a fucking pirate is that, honestly.
Bonnet sits down on the very edge of the bed. The hard mattress dips down and Izzy gasps at the movement – it’s his shoulder, he realises. Something’s wrong with his shoulder.
“Water?” Bonnet lifts the cup and his left eyebrow like he’s offering him a glass of port after a nice meal. Izzy wants to shake his head, he wants to get up and leave, he wants to bite the man’s stupid fucking head off. He nods, weak and ashamed.
Bonnet’s hand is gentle on the back of his head and the wooden cup is smooth against his chapped lips. Bonnet tilts the cup and water trickles into Izzy’s mouth and into his beard. He swallows, and swallows, and swallows, even after the cup is empty and Bonnet takes it away with pity in his eyes.
“Do you think you could eat something? Roach was cooking up some kind of mystery broth, if you’re feeling brave.”
Izzy licks his lips.
“Yes,” his treacherous mouth says. It's all he can do to keep the please from escaping, too.
Being spoon-fed by the man who stole everything from you is an experience too humiliating to bear, so Izzy is glad of the blackness that eats away at the edges of his consciousness as it’s happening, the promise of oblivion creeping closer and closer. His body aches for food, so desperate to keep fighting, even as his soul tries to pry itself free and escape the unendurable horror of his situation. Stede fucking Bonnet is gently tipping a silver spoon into his open mouth, soft and condescending, with Izzy helpless to defend himself – he thinks he can see the cruel irony of it twist up Bonnet’s lips as the man says:
“We’ve been so worried about you.”
And the way he says it takes what little comfort Izzy might have found in those words right out of them. The thought of Edward worrying about him – that’s good. The thought of him perhaps crying for Izzy in his cabin, desperate like he was after Bonnet left him – that’s a dirty, guilty fantasy Izzy would have liked to indulge in. But of course Bonnet goes and sullies it with the we. As if he cared. As if he cared for either of them, for anyone but himself.
The broth burns the back of Izzy’s throat like tears threatening to surface. He turns his head away.
xxx
Days and nights pass and Edward doesn’t come down. Izzy, delirious, dreams of a time so long ago, when they were new to this ship and Edward spent days on end in the captain’s cabin watching over a stranger that would return from the brink of death as the love of his life. Izzy dreams of a comfortable bed in a sun-soaked cabin, with Ed smoking quietly by his bedside, and wakes alone in the windowless dark – or worse yet, with Stede fucking Bonnet jostling him awake to change his bandages or feed him more of that fucking soup. Stede tells him about Ed, and what they’ve been up to. Apparently they took a whole merchant ship one foggy day when Izzy was asleep, quietly and effortlessly, and are now richly stocked with fine fabrics and fancy scented oils. Ed’s been dipping into the loot rather enthusiastically, Stede tells him, but oh, you won’t want to know about that. Izzy is confused until he notices the blush creeping into Stede’s cheeks, the lovebite peeking over his collar. For fuck’s sake.
So, Edward is prancing around abovedecks bathed in fine silks and basking in Stede’s fucked-stupid attention, but he can’t be arsed to come down here, not even to update Izzy on how Boodhari is doing as his replacement. And maybe that’s it: maybe he really has been replaced so thoroughly that no one even notices his absence. Maybe Ed is relieved to be rid of him.
“What’s our next port?” Izzy asks one day, when Stede returns once again with a bowl of soup and a fresh roll of bandages.
“Nassau, in two days. We’re set to make a fortune selling all of this stuff. I thought I could buy myself one of those floppy hats with a feather in it, for a proper captain-y vibe. What’d you think?”
“I wanna get off.”
“Not keen on the hat? Ed wasn’t, either.”
“No. I’m leaving the ship.”
“Oh.” Bonnet sort of recoils from him, frowning. “Do you need a doctor? Roach said he’d managed to patch you up well enough.”
“I’m –”
It feels wrong to say this to Bonnet, like it validates his status as captain. But Edward won’t come and Izzy is still too fucking weak to go after him.
“I’m resigning, you fucking twat.”
“Oh?”
Izzy rolls his eyes. His head hurts. Bonnet straightens up where he’s perched on the edge of the bed, clears his throat.
“No you’re not, you twat. You’re just… you’re not well.”
“I’ll get well somewhere else.”
Stede gets up, his posture still carrying that annoying private-school air of propriety.
”Like hell you will.”
The door closes behind him, and fucking locks.
xxx
They make port two days later, as promised, and the soundscape outside Izzy’s cabin changes from the soothingly constant roll of ocean waves to the faraway noises of civilisation. Izzy is well enough to leave, he reckons. He can probably keep upright long enough to make it to the nearest guesthouse and stay until he heals.
(Sometimes he wonders whether he's too badly broken to ever heal. But that's just his heart – at least he's escaping with all the useful organs intact.)
He’s just finished getting dressed when Stede enters the cabin, in his shirtsleeves and hair curled by humidity. Izzy hates himself a little for noticing that.
“I’ve drawn you a bath,” Bonnet announces. Well, that explains the hair.
“No thanks. I’ll bathe once I’m off this ship.”
“Ah.” Bonnet sounds pleased in that annoying as fuck way he has. “You won’t be able to leave just yet, I’m afraid.”
“Why the fuck not? We’ve arrived, haven’t we?”
“No boats. The crew’s gone ashore and taken the boats.”
“I’ll fucking swim then.”
Bonnet scoffs. “They’ll be back by evening. Until then, it’s just us. And the bath I’ve very considerately prepared for you, you utterly ungrateful cunt.”
Izzy almost smiles at that. That, he can work with. “Bet that’s a big achievement for you, Bonnet. Seeing as you usually do fuck-all on this ship, except flaunt the money you inherited from your daddy. Twat.”
“At least I've contributed something. You've done nothing for the past two weeks but be spoon-fed and doted on, while Oluwande picks up your slack.”
Stede’s breath is hot on Izzy’s face – how did he end up so close to him? Izzy growls.
“I’ll be out of your hair soon.”
“We’ll see about that. Now, the bath.”
"Fuck it. Fine."
Stede leads him up to the deck. Izzy looks around nervously as they enter the captains' quarters, not sure what to expect from his reunion with Edward. Two weeks is a hell of a long time for them to be apart. But there’s no one there, no leather-clad figure lounging on the sofa or sitting behind the desk. No silk-gown, hair-down, sleep-soft Ed in the captains’ bed, either.
“Where’s Edward?” Disappointment colours his voice despite his best efforts to sound casual.
Stede turns around, hand already on the bathroom doorknob. “Gone ashore, too. Business with Spanish Jackie – I’m banned from her establishment, as you know. He sends his love.”
“He does?”
“Well, no. But I’m sure he wishes you well.”
Izzy isn’t sure if Stede is being mean or stupid. Edward isn’t the type of man who “wishes people well”; either Bonnet still hasn't figured that out, or he’s mocking Izzy for wishing Ed would. Or perhaps he’s turned Edward into something soft and weak and polite and he’s rubbing it in – he’s unmade Blackbeard and then sent him into the sharp-toothed maw of the Republic of Pirates without Izzy there to protect him. Stupid. Fucking. Stede. Bonnet.
But if he’s ruined the most monstrous pirate captain of all time and broken his right-hand man – because that’s what Izzy is, broken beyond repair – then what does that make Bonnet? A force to be reckoned with, a monster beyond compare?
A monster, who pushes open the bathroom door with a stupid little flourish and invites Izzy in. Izzy – off-kilter and grieving – follows.
The fancy bathtub, the one that was too heavy to throw overboard when they got rid of all of Bonnet’s shit, is filled halfway with water that sloshes and steams gently against the gleaming copper. A towel has been laid out, along with a washcloth and various colourful soaps. There’s even a bathrobe, made out of some luxurious fabric, draped over a chair. But that’s probably Edward’s, or Bonnet’s. I can’t possibly be for him.
”That’s for you,” Stede says, pointing. ”But make sure to get your wounds dressed before putting it on. So you don’t get blood all over it.”
”I don’t need a robe.”
Bonnet gives him a mean look and continues. ”There’s the soap. The lavender is Ed’s favourite.”
Fuck that man, boasting about knowing what Ed’s favourite fucking soap is. There used to be a time when Edward couldn’t give a shit about soap. A better, simpler time. Fuck this man and his soaps.
(They smell good, so good Izzy wants to lick them. So fuck him too.)
”Do you need help undressing?”
”Absolutely the fuck not.”
"Right-o."
Once Stede is gone, Izzy peels off the grimy clothes, the sticky bandages, and carefully sits down in the tub. The water is low enough that he doesn’t have to soak his wounds in it, but there’s enough for the warmth to seep into his bones, make him want to lie back and relax. He washes himself slowly, carefully, telling himself that if the stitches hold and he’s able to clean himself, he can get the fuck off this fucking boat tonight. So he takes his time, using a little bit of the lavender soap in his hair where the scent will linger. Once he’s clean, he lies back and lets the water lap at his exhausted, aching body.
He must be weaker than he thought, because he’s suddenly startled awake from a sleep he didn’t realise he’d fallen into. His neck has gone stiff from bending against the lip of the tub and the soapy, bloody water around him has gone cold.
”Izzy?” Bonnet asks from the other side of the door.
”Yeah! Give us a fuckin’ second!” Izzy yells, scrambling to get out of the tub and seeing stars when he stands. He realises he’s about to black out a split second before his legs disappear from under him and the floor rushes up to meet him.
Stede is holding his head when he comes to, face down on the floor. Truly, is there no end to the humiliations a man must suffer before escaping this cursed fucking ship?
”Izzy,” Bonnet repeats, hands oddly soft against his cheeks.
”I’m fine.” Izzy tries to sit up and Stede offers him a towel, looking away. The gesture makes Izzy’s skin crawl. He has no modesty to preserve, there’s no privacy on ships – but then, Bonnet wouldn’t know anything about that. He’s only ever inhabited the cosy captain’s quarters with the ensuite bathroom and bathrobes and lavender fucking soaps. No one’s seen him naked, except Edward. (A tiny spark of curiosity puts itself out in Izzy’s mind before anything can come of it.) Izzy takes the towel and gets up, sitting on the edge of the tub when the room begins to tilt dangerously. He dries himself off in full view of Bonnet, who looks at the walls, then the floor, then eventually at him.
”Do you need help with the bandages?” Bonnet asks. Izzy could swear his eyes wander, just a bit, even though he tries to hide it.
”No,” he says. Now that they’re clean, his wounds look much smaller, he can see they’ve begun to heal. Maybe Roach does know his shit.
”Are you sure?”
”Yes, fuck off.”
”Let me at least help you get dressed. If you don’t want the robe, I can lend you something else. Some soft cotton, perhaps, for comfort.”
”Just fuck right off, Jesus Christ. My clothes are fine.”
Stede makes a face at the filthy, bloodied mess of leather and linen lying in a heap on the floor.
”Your clothes are disgusting.”
"They're fine."
"Wish you'd have slightly higher sartorial standards, Izzy."
”Suck my dick,” Izzy says, to bring some variation to the general theme of ”fuck off”. But Bonnet’s eyes flick down below his waist and his mouth falls open a little. His wet, pretty mouth, that’s surrounded by a rough blond stubble. Izzy shifts, a little hot all of a sudden.
”Oh,” Bonnet says. ”Hm.”
”Figure of speech,” Izzy says. ”I wasn’t asking.”
”What if I’m offering?”
Stede takes a step forward and now Izzy is definitely hot and a little bit bothered. It's like there's not enough air in the room, or something.
Is this what he does with Ed? Bathes him, sucks him off, then wraps him in soft cotton pyjamas and takes him to bed? It's fucking ridiculous. But Edward’s always had a weak point, an opening where a soft word or a kind look might worm its way in. It’s why Izzy had to spend all those years protecting him. Izzy, on the other hand, has only one weakness – Edward. By protecting him he has protected himself.
And now he’s failed.
Now, he’s here.
”What about Edward?” He hates how weak he sounds. Predictable, craven, disgusting. Pleading.
Stede’s smile could cut diamonds. ”He told me to do whatever it takes. Carte blanche.”
”What’re you on about?”
”Whatever it takes to keep you.”
It’s too much, even with Bonnet stopping an arm’s length from him and not moving closer. Izzy is staring, he knows, but he can't help it. The cold smugness of Bonnet’s voice, the words –
”Israel.”
Izzy feels the name like a gentle fist in his hair, like a hand ghosting over his neck. He goes a little limp with it, ashamed of how eager he is to earn whatever praise lurks underneath Bonnet’s commanding tone.
”Yes?”
Bonnet sinks to his knees and puts his hands on Izzy’s thighs, pushing them open. He looks at Izzy and Izzy is already embarrassingly hard, embarrassingly wet from the way Stede’s hands pin him into place against the tub.
Ed sent him here. Or maybe Bonnet is lying, just playing some kind of a sick rich-people mind game with them both. Or maybe it really is Edward, wanting to test how badly Izzy would fuck things up. Maybe the only way to find out is to say –
”Fucking get on with it then, Bonnet. Or do you not know how?” Izzy spits out through gritted teeth, gripping the edge of the tub so hard he feels it as a cold stab in his injured shoulder.
”I’m a quick learner. Ed’s always said so,” Stede hums, and Izzy is so angry with him, so jealous, so consumed by agony, and then Stede takes him in his mouth.
The wet heat of it is immediately overwhelming. His lips roam, gentle and curious, before his hot, clever tongue presses firmly against Izzy and forces a moan out of him before he can get his own treacherous tongue under control.
“Fuck,” he whispers, knuckles white against the copper of the bathtub. Stede makes a noise in the back of his throat and sucks Izzy into his mouth, and there’s teeth now and God, Izzy burns with humiliation at the way his breath stutters out of him.
If Blackbeard could see them now, with his boyfriend's blonde head bobbing between Izzy's shaking thighs, horrible little noises falling from Izzy's open mouth as screws his eyes shut and curls his toes against the cool floorboards. He'd kill them – kill Izzy at any rate for touching something that was his. Izzy's hand hovers over Stede's head and pulls back, returning to clutch the edge of the bathtub.
Stede’s hands travel up and down his thighs, soft fingertips and scratchy nails alternating against hot skin until his prodding fingers find and push against the stitched-close wound running from the middle of his thigh to his knee. Izzy’s brain short-circuits, shame and fear driven out by the white-hot pain. Blindly, he grabs the back of Stede’s head and pulls him closer. Stede mutters an ”ah” against him, into him, and Izzy’s hips buck up, into Stede's cruel mouth. The pressure stays on the wound until Izzy is sobbing between moans, and then it’s gone, Bonnet’s attention moving closer to where his mouth is already making a wet, sloppy mess of taking Izzy apart. He shivers as short fingernails graze sensitive skin, closer and closer, until he can feel fingers dipping into him, fucking into him with a blunt eagerness that has him clenching around the intrusion and panting like a fucking dog at the pleasure that starts in his belly and runs all the way up his spine to the base of his skull.
Suddenly, both the pressure of the fingers and the delicious tease of Bonnet’s mouth are gone. The fuck?
When he can bear to look down, Stede is looking at his glistening wet hand.
”Is that… normal?” His stupid expressive voice is doing that thing where it goes really high-pitched, like a fucking girl.
”Jesus Christ, Bonnet,” Izzy manages. ”You’ve fathered multiple children.”
”But you’re not –” Stede’s slick thumb brushes over the swollen tip of Izzy’s cock and Izzy bites his lip to keep himself from crying out. ”I mean, Mary was built different, right?”
Izzy, sick with arousal, chokes out a reply that tries to be cutting but comes out just a little bit breathless.
”You never made her come?”
Stede laughs, a blush spreading over his furrowed brow. ”Women can’t come.”
”So you’re not just the world's shittest pirate but also the world’s shittest husband. Fucking hell.”
”Are you really going to complain?” Stede bends his head down, licks at him.
“I – ah – always.”
With a smirk Stede gets back to work, sucking until Izzy is painfully hard and letting his teeth graze sensitive skin until Izzy’s on the verge, panting and pleading. Just when Izzy thinks it might be too much, or just enough, Stede pulls away. He’s breathing hard, cheeks flushed and chin glistening wet.
”I want to fuck you.”
It’s a statement, so astonishingly cocky and assuming that Izzy wants to hit him. Instead, somehow, he nods.
Stede gets up and sort of… shoves him forward onto his feet, and then further until he’s pressed against the wall across from the tub. Izzy almost cries out when his injured shoulder hits the wall but doesn’t – that’s something he’s used to, it’s fine. The solid warmth of Bonnet’s body presses against him, holds him still while Bonnet gets his own breeches open. He sighs, and then there’s the hot, heavy press of a hard cock grinding against Izzy’s ass.
”Can I?” Stede breathes into his ear. ”You’re so wet, I want to –”
Izzy can’t bear to say it. I've never hated another person like I hate you, and also I've never been this hard or this desperate, and yes God fuck please fuck me. He can't say it, so instead he makes a small non-committal noise and then his legs are being kicked apart, rough hands grabbing his hips and pulling him back, the clumsy drag of a cock between his thighs before Bonnet shoves him into the wall and pushes into him.
”Fuck,” Stede gasps. He pulls back and thrusts back in, so deep Izzy is nearly lifted off his feet. It punches a little whimper out of him – god, it’s been a long time since anyone had him like this. He’s forced to the tips of his toes to accommodate the height difference, and he clenches helplessly around the throbbing girth of Bonnet’s cock. Jesus.
The most obscene thing of all, Izzy thinks dazedly as the man behind him finds an eager, energetic pace that has them both panting, the thing that feels more lewd than Bonnet giving him sloppy head or impaling him on his massive cock, the hardest thing to bear, is Stede’s broad, warm chest pressing against Izzy’s back, one arm circling his hips and the other snaking up to his chest, a sweaty palm grabbing at his pec. Stede sighs against his neck and Izzy’s heart feels small and tight at the warmth radiating from the other body, sparks of pleasure running under his skin in a way that has nothing to do with the way Bonnet’s cock occasionally manages to hit him just right.
I couldn’t escape if I wanted to, he thinks, and of course it isn’t true. Even with his shoulder all fucked up, he could still grab Bonnet and have him pinned to the floor, cock dripping and wrist broken, in two seconds if the mood struck him. But he lets himself be held. He lets Stede’s body rock against him, lets the man babble into his ear – does he honestly not ever shut up? – and fuck him, clumsy and close. He’s teetering on the edge, the more than adequate-sized cock in him not quite enough, and he drags his own hand off the wall to guide Stede’s touch lower, where he’s so hard he can feel his heartbeat throb painfully between his legs. Stede’s fingers find him and fuck, he’s no good, his breathless pleas of ”let me touch you” not compensating for the graceless fumbling, so Izzy wraps his own fingers around Stede’s wrist and shoves his hand where he wants it. He feels his entire body writhe at the sudden wave of pleasure and Stede whimpers, crowding him closer against the wall. Izzy lets his hips twitch against Stede’s hand, keeps time with the thrusts of Stede’s cock, and when the movement of their bodies tips him over the edge he turns his head and bites down on the arm holding him up.
”Fuck!” Stede’s hips stutter and he groans into Izzy’s hair, hot heavy breath growing quicker and then slowing down. Izzy is too shaky and dazed to care about what’s happening, it’s all he can do to stay upright as the haze of pleasure dissipates and leaves him utterly boneless. Stede sighs, and moves away, and something hot and sticky trickles down Izzy’s thighs. He leans his forehead against the wall and tries not to think about the fact that he’s dripping Bonnet’s cum all over the fancy floor of his fancy bathroom. What has he done?
”Let me… Let me clean that up,” Bonnet mumbles, and suddenly there’s a hand on his lower back and a warm wet towel between his legs and –
”Get your fucking hands off me! Fuck!”
Stede pushes him against the wall, the towel continuing to clean the mess they’ve made.
”Edward usually says thank you.”
Izzy spins around and throws the rag on the floor. ”Don’t,” he says, a horrible tremor in his voice.
Stede crowds him against the wall, something in him softening. ”Fine.”
And then he’s kissing Izzy, head tilted to capture his lips in something wet and gentle and over before it really began.
”You know where to find us.” Stede steps away, picks up the dirty towel and takes it to a basket in the corner. He busies himself with something, leaving Izzy to lean against the wall, winded and burning up with shame. His thigh hurts, he feels rubbed raw everywhere Stede touched him, and he’s so tired.
Slowly, he moves across the room and picks up the robe. It’s dark green, silk or some other insanely expensive soft shit. It’s smooth and heavy when he picks it up and drapes it over his shoulders.
”I’ll get your clothes laundered and returned to you.” Stede still has his back turned to him.
Izzy ties the silky rope that pulls the robe closed around his waist. The soft material brushes against his calves and the sleeves sit right where they’re comfortable, like the robe’s made to be worn by him. His hands tremble when he thinks of the raided merchant ship with its fine fabrics.
”Thank you.”
It’s not much more than a whisper, and Izzy can’t tell if Stede even heard him. He heads for the bathroom door, bare feet soft on the floorboards.
He’s just about to slink out through the cabin when Ed strolls in.
Izzy’s breath is taken away, his heart stilled in his chest. He’s beautiful, power and confidence incarnate, as kicks the cabin door shut behind him and stalks forward, smiling as he says,
”Stede! Mate, you won’t believe –”
He sees Izzy and stops. Izzy can hear footsteps behind his back, Stede exiting the bathroom and coming to stand next to Izzy.
”Darling. You’re back.”
”Mmh-hmm.” Ed’s hands have gone to grip his weapons.
”Edward,” Izzy says.
”You’re okay.” Edward’s voice is warm with relief but his shoulders are tense, his eyes avoiding Izzy.
”Yeah.” Izzy stands up straighter, clutching the robe close and trying to look casual about it. He feels naked and shy. ”I’m okay.”
”Good. That’s good,” Edward says, gaze already seeking out Bonnet, who smiles benevolently at them. He looks put together, like nothing’s happened, apart from a couple of golden curls sticking to his sweaty temples. And Ed and Izzy look at him like they’re asking for permission to speak, to fucking breathe in his presence. It’s terrifying, the power he holds over them.
”Well, you should probably rest after all that exertion, Israel.” Stede’s voice is smooth now. ”Unless you had something in mind, my love?”
Izzy takes the hint, and takes in the sight of Ed walking over to Stede, wrapping his arms around Stede’s waist.
”No,” Ed says, still looking just past Izzy, fingers bunched tight in the linen of Stede’s shirt. ”Just… Glad to have you back, Iz. Really.”
"Thank you, Captain."
Stede smiles at Izzy and nods towards the door. ”Dismissed.”
Izzy has served a monster before.
Maybe he can learn to, again.