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In a flurry of gold, weeks zip into months on the Revenge. Her rudder sings strain over the sea, her crew revitalized with the return of her true captain, a trail of ships scuttled and burned, ravaged and pillaged, in her wake.
Cannons are wicked under the orders of first mate Izzy Hands, feelings are unveiled in talk-it-throughs with the gentle guidance of co-captain Stede Bonnet, and schemes are devised by history’s greatest tactician, co-captain Edward ‘Blackbeard’ Teach.
Really, the legend’s a load of bullshit just like the rest of them, ‘cause if Ed’s honest, he’d be dead without Izzy. Izzy knows when to rein him in on his whims, while Stede indulges them zealously, in awe of his ‘rugged pirate-y lifestyle’, he said once.
Besotted as he is with the man, Ed struggles to even criticize how much Stede is lacking on the rugged pirate-y front, just as he fought to even ‘talk it through’ when Stede came back, crew cramped into a dinghy, looking like they’d been dredged from the sea.
(That was true for only one of them. Ed still struggles to look Lucius in the eyes.)
There came a point, though, no more than two days ago, where he realized that Stede’s fervent excitement and enthusiasm can’t always substitute for his shortcomings.
Edward was helpless when he’d seen it. Though he tried to save his ass, not for the first time since his return, there were too many bodies thrashing in his way. Stede was put right at the end of some bastard’s sword. Edward could swear that he heard him reusing the ‘Mr. Wavey Blade’ line.
For no other reason than an attacker wanting to retort with a shitty one-liner before putting an end to the infamous Gentleman Pirate, Izzy was close enough to lunge at them like a feral animal, tearing him apart and spraying them both with blood.
Within seconds, there was movement in Edward’s periphery, and he pistol-whipped a faceless bastard, the fearsome Blackbeard throwing another man to sea for her to finish off.
This fantastical figure of the dread pirate Blackbeard exists only within the carnage of battle, orchestrating the crew as they pillage like one living, breathing thing. In the quietude of long journeys or dropped anchors, he’s Edward, through mirthful laughter and camaraderie.
What Stede had done, in their weeks of wreaking havoc at sea, raiding French brigantines like shooting fish in a barrel, was sandpaper Ed’s jagged edges, soften his spiny bits and sharp points until he was safe to hold and coddle, to soothe and love.
The question that arises then is, what is Izzy Hands to do without the shadow of Blackbeard within which he strikes, a structure by which to live?
Edward has observed its answer in the palpable frustration of his first mate, who stomps around retying knots and swabbing a deck already swabbed as she gets, reflecting the sun’s endless incursion on the overheated crew. He gives himself these imaginary tasks, lumbering around the place. The crew has, under Ed’s swear that he’ll keep it confidential, lest they get smacked around by the ornery man further, complained to him that he really ‘messes with the vibe’.
What he tells them then is that Izzy’s ‘just like that’, because it’s true, but that he’ll have a sit-down with him anyway, just to see if they can solve the conflict. Stede’s always better at that shit, but Izzy seems to physically repel him at any given time.
There have been changes in Ed’s repeated confrontations: Izzy gets less physical with the crew; Izzy accommodates their preferences; Izzy is attempting patience in response to their learned lackadaisical attitudes from the limp wrist leadership of Stede Bonnet.
Now isn’t a particularly good example, but Ed’s got one of his masterful schemes, something he thinks will really be a long-term fix to multiple issues around the Revenge.
As it stands, Izzy has a blanching fist of Black Pete’s waistcoat, carrying him like a scruffed kit and griping, just loud enough for Ed to catch, “The lack of discipline and diligence aboard this vessel is fucking abhorrent, you lot just think you can lay around, just because ohhh, the sun is out, just like it is every other fuckin’ day–”
“I was– I was getting to it, Mr. Hands, jeeeezus, just– I’ll fix the knots!”
“Izzy,” Ed intercepts them smoothly, rolling his shoulders, giving it the whole deal so Izzy rests his full attention on him. Ed’s been watching Izzy for a while, mirroring the Swede’s position, sans the fact that the Swede had climbed up the shrouds the way he does, and Ed was leaning most of his weight on the running rigging. He likes to live on the wild side and dance around on the razor’s edge a bit. He knows what he’s doing.
Stede has also been watching Izzy, though he’s a bit more subtle about it.
For the better half of the day since Ed pried them out of bed, Stede's been puttering about, interacting with his crew. He dubbed Frenchie and Feeney’s spots on the main deck their craft corner. The two of them grimaced and gave replies with half-assed enthusiasm. Ed thought it was sort of cool, but Izzy distracted him again with the complaining under his breath as he did everyone’s work.
“Yes, Edward?” Izzy sounds tired. Hopefully not too tired.
“Y’mind letting Dread Black Pete go?” Ed requests, nudging Izzy’s toe cap with his own. Pete always turns pink when he says it and, according to Izzy, who pays far more attention to the details, he was also on Ed’s crew at some point, which means Ed’s definitely marooned him twice. So, he tries to be nicer to this one.
“Thanks, Blackbeard,” Pete rushes out. He scampers off, pink-faced, freed from Izzy’s obstinately gripping fist to properly complete his relatively simple chore of belaying some of the ship’s rigging line. If he was really on Ed’s crew, then he was able.
(If not, then that might be why Ed dropped that batch on some sandbar.)
With a flick of his gaze, Ed realizes Stede is watching them, through owlish eyes over his afternoon tea. He tilts his head away from Stede, who unsubtly starts traipsing along the starboard side like he’s just going for a walk.
“I got a favor to ask of you, Iz,” Ed says, sure to keep his voice hushed. “Something that you might like a bit more than chores.”
Izzy perks up. Ed hates to let him down, but Stede sucked him fucking dry last night, and he’s yet to recover from that, nor has he any idea how to even approach the whole topic of still wanting Izzy as close as he has Stede – which is a bigger issue, but fuck it.
Ed looks up. The sun dances across the sky as it works to wear the crew right out. From the look of it, it’s still a good six hours before sundown, which works just about fucking splendidly for Ed’s plan. There’s one small issue. “You’re not gonna like it.”
Just as quick as the enthusiasm came, it dwindles out, and Izzy sighs, “What is it?”
“Stede-related,” Ed prefaces. Izzy’s reaction is about what Ed expects, but fuck, he can hear his teeth grinding. “You’ve seen him with a sword, right?”
“Yeah. Fucking awful, so spare me any of your fucking rhapsodizing.”
“Not gushing,” Ed mumbles. Stede’s extremely indiscreet attempt at eavesdropping is right in his periphery. “He’s gotten better, but you saved his ass the other day, and I realized–”
“Edward,” Izzy warns.
“-that it might be good if it was you to really show him the ropes on swordplay, make sure he doesn’t get his ass killed. That’d be bad. For me, for you. For crew morale.”
“I’m not– it wouldn’t– since when do you care about crew morale?” Izzy sputters. “Ed, the ship you ran just months ago, crew would’ve thought you were fucking magicked.”
“Not months ago now, is it?” Ed reminds him, not for the first time, nor for the last. Izzy’s really bad about having his mind fixed on the past, which Ed understands enough, but also the present is right here and gleaming, bright as the sun. “C’mon.”
“No.”
“Izzy.” Ed raises his eyebrows.
“Said no, Ed,” Izzy emphasizes, but his face betrays him, all flighty again.
“But you didn’t mean it,” Ed declares, only half of a bluff, but through dumb luck, some fluky miracle, he turns out to be right. Izzy sighs, long and heavy, resigned.
“And why can’t you just fucking do it?”
“Mm,” Ed hums, thinking of an excuse that isn’t related to how much he thinks it might help to force the two of them to talk. “We just have too much fun, but you’ve always been real serious about that shit. We taught each other. I’m not any better than you. He’s got a better chance of actually learning something if it’s you. How bad would it be?”
Izzy laughs bitterly. “Bad enough that my sword might slip and get him bleeding all over the clean deck.”
“Izzy,” Ed says, busting out the big guns with a voice that edges into authority, before softening entirely. He bats his eyelashes and lifts his brows for his finishing touch. “C’mon. Just spar with him tonight, and if it’s so miserable, then I’ll keep trying on my own.”
Izzy sucks in a breath, growling and bitter, and grits out, “Fine.”
“By sunset.” Ed’s saying, even as Izzy turns to stomp off elsewhere. He follows ahead. “Izzy- Izzy! Did you hear?! I told you–”
“-by sunset, Edward. I’ve got it,” Izzy repeats, holding the hatch from the gundeck’s ladder. Ed watches him struggle down the steps until he’s gone. He’s always been pretty devout, in that way, always following Ed’s commands, even if he’s kicking and screaming, bitching and moaning about it.
With their journey spanning another day, Ed stretches and deems it as good a time as any to retire to the great cabin for a fucking nap, not bothering to question the conspicuous lack of Stede on deck.
When Izzy creeps into Stede’s vision, he’s mostly forgotten about the peculiar exchange on the main deck, of which he understood little, that occurred earlier that day.
He pays the stout man no more than a cordial “Oh, hello there, Izzy,” before returning his focus to his discussion, with a quickened heart and heated cheeks.
“I’m just saying, Captain, with what happened to that ship, it’s not good, having bananas on the ship,” implores Frenchie, gesticulating at Stede with an odd air of desperation about him that almost convinces Stede to drop the notion of a 40-banana cake.
“You say that as if I’ve heard of this- this tall tale, about, what was it?”
“No ships that carry bananas are seen again!” Frenchie repeats, his delivery and word choice even wilder than his first plea when he’d overheard Stede discussing what they could afford to indulge in when they port. Their spoils alongside Edward’s riches are always enough to keep them satisfied, but Stede still has his sweet tooth to sate.
“It’s true,” says Roach suddenly, after only spectating this entire bizarre exchange through drags of his cigarette. Stede has heard a smidgeon less superstition from him, so he raises a brow to give it some consideration, then looks back to Frenchie.
“Oh, so you believe him?” Frenchie scoffs.
“I am sorry for trying to defend you when you word things like a crazy person–”
“I’ve heard bananas can be quite healthy,” Stede tries, raising his eyebrows and tilting his head down, the perfect pitch.
“Nah,” Roach decides, waving his hand at Stede flippantly.
As the captain, Stede could absolutely veto that verdict in favor of satisfying his craving for fruity cake, but Roach is the chef, so Stede supposes that he knows best in culinary matters. He does always make the most of what they have, meager as their rations get; their food supply is now maintained mostly by them skimming the usual routes and assailing a poor little merchant ship occasionally to restock and plunder.
“Alright,” Stede huffs. He watches as Lucius, whose eyes are glazed much like a cake, snaps into reality enough to cross out bananas from the parchment, near missing the inkwell. “Are you alright, boy?”
“Nn’yeah,” Lucius answers.
“Think he’s just been pried off of Pete,” Frenchie supplies, gesturing vaguely.
“What do you mean, ‘pried off’?” Stede inquires, his face scrunching.
“Do not ask questions that you do not want the answers to, Captain,” Roach advises. That stirs curiosity, but his attention is caught forthwith by a quiet shuffle. He only then recalls that Izzy entered, at some point. He stands awkwardly at the entry.
“Do come in,” Stede invites, then turns to the rest of them. “Be on your way now.”
Lucius has a bit of a limp in his walk, the same way Izzy does as he enters, but Stede is fairly certain he’s not missing any more of his digits than his index finger. Izzy skulks closer. Roach weaves around him, glancing from him to Stede. “Do not make a mess of my kitchen.”
Before Stede can even try to figure out how they would make a mess by talking, Roach’s sprightly walk winds around the corner, leaving Stede alone with Izzy. “What is it?”
“Stupid, is what it is,” Izzy begins sourly, pulling on the stringy bits of his sleeves. Stede's attention locks onto the moving tendons of his bare right hand. He swallows. “Edward is making me spar with you. Tonight. By sunset.”
“Ah,” Stede says, uncomprehending, before finally lifting his eyes. Izzy looks about the same as he does when Stede was looking earlier: ruggedly handsome, mildly flustered, and staring back at Stede. Expectant. “Right! Sparring. Fascinating. Why?”
“Because giving you a sword is like giving a fish a fucking quill,” Izzy says. “You just thrash around with it.”
“I imagine a fish with a quill would thrash because it can’t breathe,” Stede quips, trying to rid himself of the buzz spreading under his skin at the mere thought of sparring with Izzy. “Edward wants… rather than teaching me himself, he’d like for it to be you ?”
Izzy stares blankly at him. “That’s what I said.”
“And he wants this… by sunset?” Stede clarifies. “I mean, it’s not as though I have something better to do. We’re not reaching Port Royal for another couple of days.”
He watches Izzy lean on the wall like he’s getting comfortable, but he knows it’s solely to take his weight off of that foot. His gait isn’t remotely as impaired as it could have been, had Roach not tended to him upon their arrival, but it’s still a noteworthy disadvantage. Stede, at least, is able-bodied, even if his coordination could use some work.
“I can say that I’ve seldom been able to focus with him,” Stede remarks.
“Yeah, we can all fucking hear you,” Izzy mutters, staring at the cherry wood swirls. Stede takes the excuse to look at the man, to note everywhere his face creases, before he realizes the implications.
“That is not what I meant,” he says.
Izzy shrugs, but it’s stiff. Stede recognizes the look of him, all wrought tight with anger.
“I suppose that I’m not averse to it,” Stede resigns. A tension under his skin unspools into bubbling magma. “But tonight? Really? He’s quite set on this, isn’t he?”
“You know Edward,” Izzy returns.
Stede is surprised by the warmth in his tone, as though his acceptance has eased the both of them of their rigidity. It feels oddly easy to stand like this, even if he struggles with the force that compels him closer. “Do I? I wager that you know him much better.”
“A winning bet,” Izzy returns sardonically and pushes off of the wall.
“I’m going to beat you,” Stede declares. “Just so you know.”
“That’s not the point, Bonnet,” Izzy sighs. “We’re not– it’s not a duel, it’s sparring – Christ, what have you even been doing with Edward?”
“I’m not sure that concerns you,” Stede begins, the only forewarning for his following impudent comment: “Learning the parts of him you don’t know, I would say.”
“Oh, that’s bold.”
Stede has noticed how Edward and Izzy are, with their bickering reflective of an ancient love, but he hasn't allowed himself to explore the idea of it. He knows piracy is awash with debauchery. Of all people, it seems apt for the long-term partners to have, at one point or another, gotten rambunctious, especially if they'd known one another since youth. Truly, he finds it makes more sense than Calico Jack, but Edward must not have always had high standards.
“Is it?” He lifts his chin to regard Izzy down the bridge of his nose, quirking up a brow to illustrate faux disbelief. “You know him intimately, then?”
“We’ve been at sea for decades together, Bonnet,” Izzy drawls, that edge of anger lingering in his voice. “Not that fucking surprising, I don’t think.”
Even flushed hot, Stede knows he should tread carefully and go about this with tact. “What, um- if I might ask- changed?”
“You,” Izzy hisses, his voice like the sizzling fuse of a dynamite stick. Stede could have figured, but to be the recipient of the ire makes something guilty tighten his chest. He caused that look in Izzy’s eyes, that sinking of his shoulders. “You strolled in and Edward couldn’t resist the novelty of a new pet.”
“Right,” Stede exhales. He then adds quietly, “I don’t imagine that it has to be one or the other, though, does it?”
There’s a wheeze that accompanies Izzy’s next breath. Stede didn’t notice himself stepping closer as he spoke, but there remains only a hairsbreadth between them now. He watches Izzy’s face carefully, how it scrunches up and fills with a blotchy pink, and then he’s watching the shaggy back of his head as he jerks away and storms out of the room.
“That was odd,” Stede says into the silence, heart beating up to his throat.
Though he knows it's likely that he'll have to put in more work than it's worth trying to mold Stede into an adequate swordfighter, Izzy doesn't care. He feels discontent only for the ache of his body, the pounding of his skull, and the vile yearning in his core.
Even when Edward phrased it as a request, there was no question in it when he was tasked with being Bonnet’s personal fucking coach for swordplay. He is bound to his captain’s orders, not only by oath but by devotion that reaches far past rationality into the burning center of him. In there, his captains have unknowingly made themselves a fucking home as if it doesn’t burn them a bit.
(He knows it does. He spits and hisses in the face of their amity. He sees them flinch.)
The possibility of Stede Bonnet being deft with his sword is not impossible to grasp.
After the sea thrashed him and his crew about her merciless waters for weeks until they boarded, Stede's different. More confident. Izzy reckons they only found the Revenge because Ed had been sloppily drunk at Jackie'z, weeping loud enough for anyone to hear; intel like that can always be pilfered with the right words and weapons.
Rumors of Blackbeard going soft had begun to form as his sorrow hung heavily in his shadow, following them everywhere they went, visible in the tracks of kohl down his cheeks and a few weak words to the wrong people. All of that talk was put to rest by slices of blades, men left without limbs or carved in warning, all tormented by Ed’s clinically cruel hands. They were never finished off, nor shown mercy unless he commanded Izzy to deliver it in one simple shot between their bulged, red-rimmed eyes.
But when Stede returned, it was with blonde facial hair coming in that he’s yet to shave, hair falling in waves that he’s yet to cut, and a sharper edge to his softness. Some things remained the same. He still sometimes broke into his posh Gentleman Pirate persona when addressing his crew; Izzy doesn’t know how much of it is pretense and how much of it is Stede. Izzy wishes he didn’t want to know.
“Looks like it’s due time for our match,” comes Stede’s voice from somewhere close. Izzy jolts in alarm, swinging around to find Stede is, indeed, very fucking close. Again.
Like this, Izzy can make out the bits of gray growing into his trimmed beard, angelic hair still untainted by his age, curling effortlessly at its ends. It’s grown out since he doesn’t bother with the style anymore. He looks like a proper, gorgeous fucking pirate.
“I’ve already had it so that my crew will keep to themselves, so we’ve not got to worry about any interruptions,” Stede adds. His face scrunches like an old sock, then immediately flickers back into polite neutrality. “I’ll have to, um. Go and fetch Ed. You said he intended to watch?”
“Christ, Bonnet, just go– go get Edward.” Izzy pushes off of the railing. There's a dull ache in his foot as he rights himself. He draws his sword from where it’s tied to his thigh, slashing at the air perfunctorily. With a flash of alarm in his face, Stede skitters off.
Stupid fucking Stede Bonnet and his shimmering hair that follows him in a rippling wave, like the sun’s reflection on the water. Izzy stares at the sea. He hopes that, by some supernatural miracle, she will know his pleas and claim his body for the sharks.
Of course, she doesn’t, but he wasn’t holding his breath anyway.
When Stede returns, it’s with Edward in tow. He looks just as ravishing as he had when he pulled Izzy away from his quarrel with Pete. Stede has told Izzy that he ‘needs an outlet’. It’s not his fault that Stede doesn’t like his outlet of smacking Pete around. He's got a real shiny, slappable head, and there's no better punching bag than his face.
He thinks, as Stede chatters with Ed just out of earshot and draws his weapon, that this – this sparring – might be an even better outlet. His skin burns with the thought of putting Stede at the end of his sword, exhilaration sparking in his veins.
“Alrighty,” Stede declares, pivoting on the tips of his toes with his turn. He's always so fucking dramatic. Izzy’s heart constricts in his chest. “Where shall we start?”
Izzy regards him. He has a uniquely improper way of wielding his sword, which is one of much lighter steel than Izzy’s titanium. There's nothing ostentatiously Stede about it. No colors screeching in your face, no cavalier air to how he holds it, just a palpable discomfort. He's all stiff with his experimental movements like a wooden puppet whose puppeteer lounges against the main mast, grinning with his tongue tip between his teeth when Izzy meets his wandering eye. “What has Edward taught you?”
“Ah, well.” Stede fumbles. Izzy supposes he put him on the spot, so he just waits, sliding his thumb along the hilt of his sword to the sound of the waves. “There’s the bit about, uhm. Taking the sword on the left, and watching your opponent’s torso, for their next move, and– and, uh… what are you–?”
With no small amount of indulgence, Izzy decisively closes in on Stede to adjust his grip on his sword, fixing his warm fingers around the hilt until their grips match. Izzy even has the nerve to brush his fingers along the man’s fingerless gloves. They were Edward's, but they're Stede's accessory of choice lately, Izzy's noticed. He can admire their practicality, especially in comparison to Bonnet's usual bells and whistles. He still has ideal dexterity with his fingers free, but he's saved from the gritty fire of rope burn when he's working with the rigging. Izzy imagines the leather he's touching as Bonnet's palms, soft and not callused by a life of labor.
“Um… thank you?”
Izzy feels chagrin in his bones. “Your fucking– grip. It was wrong.”
Stede sighs softly as Izzy hovers in his space. “Right. Thank you.”
“Shut up,” Izzy utters, tearing from his paralysis with a jerk back that lands him on his bad foot again. He grunts in pain and rights himself.
There’s a quiet chuckle from Ed. He’s leaning on the mainmast, cruelly taking any opportunity Izzy might’ve had to get Stede pinned there again, maybe gut him on his good side. That’s too bad. Izzy was considering bloodying the perfectly swabbed deck.
“Do you have, perchance, any other pointers?” Stede asks, shifting himself into an awkward stance. Izzy can see about three different vantage points here, from which he could sweep Bonnet’s stupid buckled boots out from under him.
“Fix your footing,” Izzy lilts, shifting into an uncomfortable stance, manned by his right foot. Stede mirrors it. Another snicker from the mast. “Not like I have it.”
“What?” Stede fumbles with his feet. “Aren’t I supposed to model after– oh.”
“Bend your knees,” Izzy instructs, gesturing down to his own. “It makes you a smaller target, and makes it easier for you to dodge an attack– like this.”
For fun, Izzy thrusts his sword forward. Stede stumbles out of its range, barely, or else Izzy might’ve skimmed his ear, or cut off a lock of his hair. Speaking of.
“Tie your hair away from your face.”
Stede frowns. “With?”
“What, you’ve not kept any of your fucking silk ribbons? The ones I spent an entire hour putting in–” Izzy points his sword at Ed, gesturing at his chin to indicate the beard. It’s not remotely as glorious as it had been, but it’s growing slowly, long enough for the silver hairs to start curling. “The bows. You’ve not– Fuck sake– Here.”
The tie with which he keeps his sword at his thigh isn’t exactly necessary to keep around, so he removes the sheath and lays it atop the capstan, then proffers the string up to Stede. Stede, at least, doesn’t need any fucking help tying his hair back, so Izzy concludes that clearly, Edward taught him something other than how to get his dick wet.
“You’ll want to put your back to the sun, the way you have it. Makes you a harder target to look at without strain.” Izzy struggles to focus his eyes on anything but the way the bright orange light falls on Stede’s skin.
“I’ve got that down,” Stede says. Izzy knows the praise he wants, feels it catch in his throat, and doesn’t bother to dredge it out.
“Another thing,” Izzy begins instead, and lunges again, a deliberate miss that swishes just past Stede’s arm. He keeps stepping, shrinking in on himself. “Don’t stop moving.”
“Alright,” Stede acquiesces, then starts stepping back and forth with his crouch. He looks fucking ridiculous. Izzy fights a smile. “What? I’m doing exactly what you’re doing!”
Izzy must’ve been making a face. “I didn’t say anything.”
“You’ve not got to speak if your face is telling me that I’m a fool.”
“Well, you fucking look it,” Izzy tells him, unwilling to adhere to whatever palliative response Stede was grasping for. “You’re making circles. Think ahead. It would only take me a few seconds to recognize that pattern.”
“And anyone else?” Stede asks; it sounds like a compliment.
Izzy smirks at the indirect praise. “A few second buffer, but generally the same.”
“So–” Stede’s movements change, from the same circles to diagonals, then he breaks it after a few steps, never the same amount. Izzy can admit that, for one like himself who relies on the detection of patterns, Stede is making himself a noteworthy opponent.
“That’s it, but you’re–” Izzy steps forward to fix Bonnet a bit. “You lost your slouch, you fucking idiot. You’ve got to curl inward. Small target.”
“Of course,” Stede says mindlessly, his feet planted, and Izzy should just gut-stab him right now for ceasing the movement. He should also let go of his shoulders, on which he’s only tightened his grip.
He does neither of these things.
Instead, he looks Bonnet right in his ludicrously large eyes and purrs, “Good.”
“Why thank you,” Stede croaks, looking away to doggedly watch an inscrutable point over Izzy's shoulder. Izzy finally manages to free himself from Stede's magnetic field. He squints at him against the bright sky.
“Man,” Edward’s voice cuts through the tension, “those are good pointers, Izzy. Don’t know how I didn’t think of that.”
“That’s alright, Ed,” Stede says amiably, adjusting his sword grip, and hunching forward.
“You guys gonna get this thing going, then?”
Izzy had mostly been looking at the dip of Stede’s shirt. It had a low neckline, teasing a hint of darker gold hairs curled over Stede's chest. He doesn’t answer with words. He just rolls up his sleeves, slowly shifting his weight to his right foot, then strikes Bonnet’s sword as his one warning.
To his surprise, Stede flies into action almost gracefully, swooping his weapon under Izzy’s and counter-striking with fluidity Izzy scarcely found within his own movements; to be fluid was to be comfortable, and to be comfortable was to be weak, and the lily-livered won no duels.
But Stede is proving to be a far more worthy opponent than Izzy expected. Each strike has a defense at the ready. Each step is just out of range for Izzy to kick those shapely legs out without spending too long on a foot that can seldom hold his weight.
His techniques are methodical, but in Bonnet, he can see far more instinct. He takes hops back where Izzy would remain rigid in place. He's also so fucking noisy, and– and so, so fucking attractive, Izzy realizes as Stede finally springs his sword to Izzy’s.
It’s more than a defensive maneuver. It’s an attack. Izzy’s too distracted by Stede’s triumphant smile. He tries to counter, but it's beats too late and it's weak. It’s not enough. Stede’s strength wins out, by an absurd measure.
“There you go, Stede!” Ed calls supportively from the mast, his slouched posture straightened in excitement.
Stede gains on him and he stumbles back, right onto his bad foot. The other goes flying in the air. His ass lands right atop a barrel. Any attempt he might’ve made at recovery is thwarted by the sudden tip of a blade in the center of his vision, right at his chest.
He thought it’d take longer, at least, for Stede to lose, but here he is: face flushed hot, leg knocked in the air, sword held loosely in his hand. “What was that about me being, ah – what was it, Ed? An imbecile? Because it appears I’ve beat you.”
There’s a disquiet beneath Stede’s words. Stede's breaking a sweat, too, but Izzy’s been the one facing the sun like he’s fucking stargazing.
Then Stede’s eyes skirt down. Izzy follows his gaze and grasps that, for some inexplicable reason, it’s his foot that Bonnet's worried about. Izzy doesn’t let himself even begin to fantasize about why the fuck Stede would care if he hurt himself.
Of course, he's fought countless times since his injury, but these days, he relies far more on stealth than offense. He’s rusty, evident in Stede’s victorious breaths, Ed’s called out “It’s alright, Izzy” through the distance perennially separating them.
Stede isn’t separated from him at all, though. Izzy’s breaths come in heavy and pissed as Stede approaches – no, he fucking saunters, is what he does. His brows lower, concern fading as he pins Izzy to the barrel. He drags the point of his blade up lightly, all the way up to Izzy’s throat. Izzy feels like he might pass out, the sun’s scarlet bleeding becoming blurred.
There’s this charismatic roll of his shoulders, this flamboyant jerk upward of his chin. There are flyaway curls and they make sandy whiskers around Stede’s head, hairstyle easily tousled with its half-heartedness. There’s this imbalance in his stance, his eyes looking down into Izzy’s. There’s this snarky pride in his voice: “Looks like I’ve bested you again, Izzy, just like I had all that time ago. Maybe I should be the one teaching you.”
But the tip of the blade isn’t more than grazing Izzy’s skin.
“Oh, bugger!” Stede stumbles back as Izzy seizes the anger burning through him and kicks out. He vaguely feels the sword catch on his neck, but he doesn’t care. He’s back in it, grunts with every strike, forceful even as his foot sends jolts of pain to his hip, up his ribs, and even his teeth ache.
“Yeah, get feisty with him, Iz!” Ed hollers, pouring canister upon canister of camphene into the blaze that keeps Izzy on his feet, pushing, dominating, eyes twitching as he watches Bonnet’s handsome face crease with alarm. All of the showy confidence seems to leave Stede with each resounding clang of steel on steel, each inch of space stolen away as they approach Ed at the mast. Izzy pays him a glance, trying to find an excuse for the heat in the man’s voyeuristic stare.
It’s a familiar scene, even if they’re approaching from the port side. Izzy thinks his dignity is just within reach, his victory so close he thinks he can taste it, smell it in the air past the flowery sweat of Stede. Izzy remembers Stede’s chattering of cherry wood masts, his swats right on the ass, a move brazenly stolen from Edward. Izzy remembers too much.
Stede must see that his eyes get far away, his head plunged into a reverie: when Izzy expects his next swing to come from above, Stede swings his sword from below. His attack comes with a startling force that has Izzy clenching his fist around the hilt, wobbling on his shitty foot until he rights himself. His heart starts to pulse to the clangor of their rapiers.
“Come on, get your head in it, mate!”
It’s unclear if that’s directed at him or Stede: Stede’s brows are furrowed, his eyes dark even with the last of the sunlight lighting them up the best it’s able, their hazel muddled by something exhilarated, the same thing that brings a flush of red to his face.
However, it’s probably Izzy. He’s back on defense, even with his growls and an attempt to knee Bonnet where it counts that fell short and bumped the man’s elbow, only throwing off his next swing long enough for him to jolt back and recover.
Stede crouches, swaying side-to-side with that wiggle of his hips. Izzy stares down at him for a beat, their eyes locked.
“Alright, I admit it. You’re– quite skilled,” Stede offers breathlessly.
The urge to kiss him rushes through Izzy like poison. It’s more an animal instinct than a velleity, but he ignores it. He can have an empty bed with sheets stained in blood, but no matter how many lies Mr. Spriggs tells of how in love with him the Captains are, he’ll never get to have them.
“Shut up,” Izzy grits out. He strikes, wound tight with stupid feelings that release into the steel of Bonnet’s rapier each time they meet each other. The man parries well, all things considered; Izzy expects to have skimmed him by now, as he had when they first dueled, though this time he’s at least trying not to shed blood, tempting as it may be.
“I would say,” Stede starts talking between hits, apparently needing a lesson in not being fucking chatty when sword fighting, “that you and I are evenly matched!”
“That so?” Izzy indulges him in a reply, then brute-forces Stede’s sword down after applying little pressure, letting his anger flow into his hand, letting it explode out of him in the ear-piercing impact of his sword knocking Bonnet’s away.
“You rotten– what are you– oh, drat.”
With his sword held up, Izzy backs Bonnet into the railing of the ship. He may be shorter, but he still manages to bracket Bonnet’s body with his own, the blade supporting the effort. Izzy watches Stede’s eyes, which flick between his, imploring for something Izzy hasn’t the privilege to know.
“I believe I win,” Izzy says levelly, loud enough for Edward to hear where he’s at the mast.
Edward, who is noticeably not at the mast and must’ve followed them, gives a few honest claps from the ostentatious staircase to the quarterdeck. Izzy attributes the pain in his chest to his foot, somehow, even when he knows it’s only the same yearning.
“You’ve still got a lot to learn, Bonnet,” Izzy continues, trying not to let his mouth twitch up the way it always does at a lick of acknowledgment. “Don’t be so arrogant.”
“I’d hardly say I’m arrogant.”
Edward’s laugh is very poorly stifled by a quick turn of his head away.
“Edward,” Stede says, frowning.
“What? You really can be, sometimes,” Ed tells him. Stede huffs, but then turns back to Izzy.
“I think this has been quite a learning experience,” he says. His voice is tight like water-shrunken leather, his anxiety tangible like if Izzy dared to touch him, he’d feel nerves dancing beneath the reddened skin.
“Quite,” Izzy returns. His eyes linger on just how good Stede looks at the end of his sword. Stede raises an eyebrow at him and laughs quietly. Izzy’s gut somersaults.
“But,” Stede begins. Izzy feels himself start decaying slowly. “I do feel I might like a rematch! Or perhaps some more practice.”
Izzy doesn’t know what he’ll fucking do if he has to do this shit again, but somehow, he gives a brusque nod anyway. He slides his rapier down, lingering drag that makes his heart pound watching. He skulks away. He disregards the eyes boring holes into his spine as he hobbles to his room before either of them can say more.
Things go just about swimmingly with Stede and Izzy’s sparring crap. Ed initially set up the whole thing, but, somewhat unsurprisingly, the two of them go at it every other night now. He doesn’t always show up to spectate. Sometimes he has to do Captain shit; other times, he just needs some damn rest.
The only problem with it, though, is when Ed’s trying to acquire some early shut-eye and Stede comes barreling in, panting and frustrated.
“Stede,” Ed says, eyes still shut as Stede’s heeled shoes stop right outside of the bed nook. “What is it?”
“What?” Stede asks, but his voice is warbly like he’s really feeling something and trying not to. His breaths are loud, forceful exhales from his nose like he’s really trying to breathe it out.
“Izzy again?” Ed turns onto his side, opening his eyes to the cruel light of the cabin and, as it happens, to Stede’s crotch. He has to force his eyes up. The guy’s not exactly hiding in those breeches.
“Yes,” Stede says shortly, his face a bit damp with sweat, a bit flushed from all the movement. Ed could, at times, hear laughter from here. His heart tightens for them, even if somewhat because he wishes he could be there, too.
Wishes he hadn’t fucked it all up, affirmed each time Stede defeats Izzy because of what Ed's done.
“Do I have to continue these lessons?”
Whatever Ed was expecting, fuck knows, but it sure as shit wasn’t that; his bleary eyes widen a bit. “Whad’you mean?”
“Just what I said!” Stede insists, frustration almost startling. Ed must be too tired to hide that it ruffles him a bit. “Sorry, dear. He’s– how did you ever– he’s intolerable!”
“Yeah?” Ed raises a brow at Stede’s dick. Stede makes a very angry sound. “C’mon, man. You’ve barely started.”
“Ed, it’s been fortnights!”
“And you’ve been improving,” Ed agrees. “But you could still use some work. You almost got gutted on the right, on that ship. The Spanish one.”
“I’m not quite taking names anymore if I’m honest,” Stede says apologetically. Ed forgot Stede actually did track the names of the vessels he met before Ed chucked his journal to sea in grief. “I’ve been gutted on at least one Spanish vessel, but however many times I've almost been-”
“He’s got your head all messed up, doesn’t he?” Ed itches to hear the severity of Stede’s desire, beyond what he can conclude by glancing South.
“I’m just not sure how I can go on, with this– this thing just... growing.”
Staring directly at his dick, raising his brow high enough to feel his forehead wrinkle with it, Ed chuckles. “Yeah?”
“Edward!” Stede hisses, cupping his hand over his crotch like it’ll encompass the sheer fucking size of that thing. He huffs. “I wish it was just that! It’s that, too, but it’s– worse.”
“Worse than wanting to fuck Izzy?” Ed grins. “Do you want Izzy to fuck you?”
“Edward!” Stede curls in, his voice shrill and weak, before he breathes and composes himself. “It’s– It’s horrendous! He’s the ship’s first mate!”
“I mean, hey. I still want to fuck him,” Ed offers, trying to placate Stede, but mostly, he just feels sad for himself again.
“God, I’m sure that’d be lovely,” Stede groans. He pulls his hair free from Izzy’s thigh string tie, which he fucking kept, the lunatic. He shakes it out. The movement’s a bit stiff, in the way that shows he’s really not used to having all that hair and just going by what he’s seen Ed do. It’s endearing as fuck. “Not my point! I think I also would like to… romance him?”
“You and me both,” Ed sighs in admittance. “I had my chance, though. Blew that shit. Bet you could still get in on it. He really does seem into you.”
“Does–” Stede makes a face, Ed vaguely registers with his droopy-eyed vision. “Does he? He could’ve fooled me, with his– his belittlement!”
“Was it belittlement or just critique, love?” Ed shifts to hold his head in his hands, widening his eyes to keep them open. He doesn’t want Stede to think he doesn’t care just because he’s damn sleepy.
“I’m… not sure.” Stede casts his eyes down, looking ashamed of his inability to distinguish the two. Ed thinks about reaching to take his hand in consolidation, but it’s too snug under this fancy pillow. “It's, ah. It’s hard to tell. Especially with him!”
“I know,” Ed says, then laughs. “He sings his praises to me only ‘cause I taught him to, otherwise it’s all backward.”
“Not too unlike you,” says Stede in consideration. Whatever idea Stede’s considering, Ed wants to shunt away, trying to sleep and not think about what he had before he neglected it until it withered. Stede was always better with plants. The evidence of that still flourishes on the harpsichord, outgrowing its container.
“Maybe not. What’d he do, though?”
“Oh, he’s just–” Stede’s hands flail angrily. “He kept looking at me while we were sparring. He was so aggressive! He looked like he wanted to kill me!”
“That’s my Iz,” Ed speaks by instinct alone. He feels himself shrink into the bed a bit more, even as Stede smiles fondly. “He just does that, mate. ‘Specially if he wants to get like that with you.”
“Right– it was just frustrating. He’s impossible to read,” Stede laments. “He’s always looking like he wants to kill me, but his eyes will be on my chest, or- or my lips. Wouldn’t he do something, if he wants to get like that with me?”
“Maybe.” Ed shrugs. “You’d hope so, but he can be a real shit about that. So can you. You’re both fucking doomed.”
“Lovely,” Stede sighs. “I appreciate the prognosis.”
He takes a deep, exasperated breath, deflating on an exhale. Most things deflate, anyways, but where Ed’s been trying not to look still seems a pressing matter.
“Could…” Ed’s eyes fall back down. “Could help you let off some steam. You need that?”
“Need is not the word I would use,” Stede says carefully. Fucker always detects Ed’s whole weird thing about consent, or the distinct lack thereof, even when Ed doesn’t. “I'd say… would very much enjoy it, but can very much live without.”
“Shit. Well, it’s a good thing I want to suck your dick, then, isn’t it?”
“Uh,” Stede fumbles. He always flusters when Ed speaks bluntly like that. His face gets all rosy at any vulgarity. “Yes.”
For some of their matches, Ed will spectate. For some of the others, he’ll only know that they’ve happened from the sound of steel whipping through the air, the feeling of Stede’s boner when he slides into bed and lays stiff and pitiful, the sight of Izzy positively fucking glaring at them the next morning with a worsened limp that tells Ed he’s destroyed himself on his fingers. Poor guy’s been really fucking angry lately, but it’s not Ed’s job to orchestrate everything for them.
“Right,” Stede says, then swiftly starts stripping down. Ed lets the comfort of the bed envelop him while he waits, idly rubbing at himself for an interest check. Stede must still be on adrenaline because he really hustles with those clothes, but Ed manages a semi by the time Stede shuffles into bed with whispered swears. He’s hard enough to shatter stone, in contrast.
“Look at you,” Ed coos, kissing the pink head as Stede takes himself in hand and presses his prick right up to Ed’s lips. Ed opens his eyes as it slides over his tongue, locking them with Stede’s, and fuck, Stede looks sick with it.
“Edward,” Stede whines as Ed licks at his crown. “You were– oh– right, I want him where you are, too.”
Ed takes it out of his mouth, lips still pressed to the base when he purrs, “Yeah? You want to feed Izzy your cock, Stede?”
“Yes,” Stede gasps, rutting against Ed’s unmoving lips. “I want to make him yield to me, too, for once.”
“Oh, he yields,” Ed assures, the memory this time burning him. He finds the motivation to keep his palm moving over himself, now, as he fattens up just thinking about Stede and Izzy together. “You should see what he looks like when you shut his trap with some fingers. Or a dick, ‘course, but you can’t really do that just- at random.”
“Edward,” Stede keens. His cock drips precome onto Ed’s lips. Ed licks it off, the tip of his tongue brushing Stede’s slit in the process. “Please.”
“Tell me that you’ll talk to him and I’ll consider it,” Ed says coolly, letting a bit of his desire seep into his voice.
“Alright,” Stede decides immediately. He’s been more confident by miles lately. Those lessons are really paying off, too; Ed’s seen him run through a guy, taking a life without weeping. “I’ll talk with him, test the waters to see if he would want in on–” Stede gestures between them, “us.”
“I dunno if he’ll want us, but I can tell he’s wanting you,” Ed says. “And you’ve got my permission.”
Stede hums distantly, reaching down to angle properly, but Ed catches his wrist. “Edward, please.”
“Yeah, I got you.” Ed parts his lips, permitting Stede’s cock to slide in again. Stede just hovers there, smearing his wet tip into Ed’s lips, so Ed adds, “Just imagine I’m Iz, yeah? And– fuck, tell me what you want to do to him.”
“Well,” Stede breathes, cock finally slipping past Ed’s lips. They both groan. At this angle, Ed’s neck twinges when he moves, so he tries to gesture with his chin, loosening his jaw, authorizing a proper skull fucking as he relaxes his gag reflex in advance. “I do find the concept of having him, ah, like this quite enthralling.”
Ed hopes that Stede can make out the ‘yeah?’ he hums around Stede’s cock as he stutters into a slow rhythm. He’s always really shy about this. Reserved until he loses his grip, then Ed’s jaw aches into the next day, his voice blown.
“I want to, um– ah– want to… when he gets so angry, I just want to take him, and– God, you feel amazing,” Stede drops off, his focus shifting to thrusting into Ed’s mouth. He keeps it pliant for Stede to let go of all of that anger. “I wonder if he’d be easy like this.”
“Mmhm,” Ed hums through a mouthful of dick. Stede throbs at the end of his tongue.
“Oh my goodness,” he gasps, starting to go faster with it, like the confirmation set him off. Ed fails to restrain a laugh that bubbles up from his chest, but Stede gets wilder with it. He fucks Ed deeper, the whole length buried inside.
Only one hand splays out on the bed next to them, supporting his weight with the odd angle, but the other one stretches over his face, encompassing everything but his widened eyes between fingers. The movements get spasmodic, his grunts rising in pitch, and he’s got to be close, so Ed hums in encouragement, jerking off hastily.
“You’re teaching me so well,” Stede babbles, words muffled by his hand, eyes scrunching shut. “You look– oh– you’re perfect!”
He’s talking to Izzy through Ed, which might be weird, but Stede was weird, so it was pretty fucking normal by that standard and also really fucking hot.
“I’ve got to– please, where–”
Ed hopes that shifting up to lodge Stede’s cock down his throat answers that question. It seems to, with how frantic he gets. He cries out into his palm as he pounds for the last few thrusts. Ed manages to chase his orgasm over the edge as he feels Stede start shooting down his throat, sliding out to let it stream down his tongue.
“Izzy!” Stede shouts. His hand, unfortunately, grasps at literally nothing rather than continuing to muffle his cries as he spills around Ed’s suckling lips. Ed just keeps going, a bit mindless because now his hand’s covered in spunk.
“How do you always keep me awake like this?” Ed asks rhetorically once Stede has cleaned them up. Stede shrugs, looking away like he’s even remotely guilty about it. Ed laughs at that, pulling back the blankets for Stede to clamber in. “You better actually talk to him.”
“I stay true to my word,” Stede says sleepily.
“Before sunset.”
“That’s fine by me. Thank you, Edward.”
Ed tugs Stede into his arms. Even with the cramped space in his bed, Ed feels the emptiness where Izzy could fit. “‘Course. ‘Night, Stede.”
“You’re so good to me,” Stede purrs, smiling. “Goodnight, my darling.”
A sword hilt imbued with palm sweat clatters onto the main deck. Stede watches it, his shoulders falling back as he effectively pins Izzy to the mast. The point of his own sword presses to Izzy’s abdomen, unmoving, prodding him with each heaved breath.
He waves his hand to Izzy’s lost sword. “Well, aren’t you going to get it?”
“Kind of fucking hard to.”
Not the only thing that’s hard, Stede has noticed. This time, he may be bold enough to do something about the tension, rather than further subjecting Edward to his madness whilst ignoring the catalyst of it. Ed watches from above on the quarterdeck, noticeably waiting.
“In that case, I believe that I win,” Stede declares. He doesn’t move. Neither does Izzy.
“Fuck off,” Izzy spits back at him, then attempts to writhe himself free of Stede, but he’s boxed him in. It only presses them closer.
“Izzy,” Stede breathes with no antecedent words, even while Izzy stares expectantly.
“What?”
Stede didn't manage to plan all this out quite yet, but he’s likely had this talk with himself about eighty times over, just thinking about how he’d approach Izzy, the feral animal that he is. It’d have to be careful, like caging a creature from the wild and teaching it affection, whilst straining not to overbear it with the love you feel for it.
At that moment, Stede forgets all of this and leans in to kiss Izzy.
Immediately, before Stede can even fully realize what he’s doing, Izzy kicks him away. Izzy sputters incoherently, his face as pink as the sunset behind him, his back still to the mast, his ribs still expanding and fighting against his vest with his heavy breaths. Stede's heart aches with the rejection, even when he knows himself foolish for it.
“What the fuck, Stede?” Izzy hisses. Stede sees vivid anger in his face and, though it’s unaccompanied by the repulsion Stede was worried about, he still shrinks in on himself a bit. Izzy gestures wildly up to Ed, who throws his arms up in a shrug.
“Told him it was fine,” Ed says, hopping down the steps a bit too urgently, too careless about the knee that may need a massage later on. Stede doesn’t feel entirely safe from Izzy lunging at him and taking a chunk out of his skin or gutting him anew. “Gave him my word, Iz. Don’t point at me.”
“What the fuck is this?” Izzy grits out. Ed slings a casual arm around Stede’s shoulders. Stede’s head fills with static. “This some kind of fucking joke? Is everyone– what, have you got them in barrels, waiting to hop out and laugh at me?”
“What?” Stede’s face squinches. “No, of course not. They're having dinner below- they'd not even fit-”
“Where are they, then?” Izzy looks around. “Because I fuckin’ know you’re not serious.”
“Izzy,” Ed attempts to intervene.
“Do you not want it?” Stede asks, still feeling a bit sore from the spurning that he somehow did not anticipate. Ed swore he would be eager, grateful, and all of these lovely things that Stede didn't even know if he wanted, though ultimately, he came to expect them. He wants Izzy as he is, rather than what Ed has said he can be, so he solemnly welcomes the ache.
“I– what– what, just because my prick's–” Izzy’s gloved hand lowers, fingers fanned out, gesturing to the front of his leathers. “That just– fucking happens with adrenaline, Bonnet. Got fuckall to do with this.”
“Really? Because I don’t seem to recall you ever getting this way during raids, sans a few occasions when we’ve fought, side by side by side, the three of us,” Stede says. They're Edward’s words, not his. He grinds his teeth together, his nails digging into the cuffs of his loose poet’s shirt, and he hopes that Izzy won’t call his bluff.
“I could say the same about you,” Izzy replies.
“So, you two gonna do anythin' with this fucking profound knowledge, or are we just gonna- gonna sit here and talk about it?”
“If I’ve taught us anything, I would hope it’s that things must be talked through-”
“Yeah, yeah, Stede, but Izzy’s–” Ed looks at Izzy, then their eyes meet.
Unnervingly, Izzy looks like he might cry.
“Izzy’s not… really a talker.”
“When did you try?”
“Suppose not a lot, huh?” Ed’s voice is hollow, filled with the same despondent air it carries when he talks about his history with Izzy, how he wants nothing more than to recover their love from its ashes. “Man, Izzy, I’m– I’m sorry. I know I fuckin’ tore everything up.”
“Not saying that,” Izzy mutters, then their eyes break, and then it’s back to looking at Stede. The eye contact is bold in a way that sort of startles him, but he holds fast, unyielding, unwavering. “And you– fuck you, Stede Bonnet. Fuck you, and your– your fucking beard, and your fucking hair, and your goddamned smile, and fuck how all of that shit makes me feel.”
Izzy starts to stomp off, but this time, Ed manages to snag him by the back of his vest. “Izzy, you want to talk? Let’s talk.”
“Not much to fucking say about it, Edward. Bonnet’s done something to my brain. You’ve always– you’ve always had shit done to my brain. You know that, but you both keep fucking toying with me and yet I’m still right fucking here.”
“Ever consider that we aren't just toying with you, Izzy?” Stede chimes in, tilting his head the way he does when he means to convince. “Maybe it might be that we want you, too. The both of us. Imagine it, if you can. We bring terror to these seas, yet share love between-”
“Not sure what that has to do with buggering you.”
“But would it just be buggering?” Stede has been trying to keep his nerves from crackling into his voice, but he’s failing quite a bit. He takes a deep breath, lets his shoulders roll back, and summons a bit more confidence from goodness knows where. “Or might you just want to kiss, too? Have tea in the mornings, the way Edward and I do? Feel someone next to you in bed– I know there may not appear to be room, but I can assure you, there is.“
“Why the fuck would I want that?” Izzy grits out, unconvincing in his ire. “Love is a distraction. You two seem to have fucking forgotten that.”
“Is that why you always lose to me during our duels?”
“I’m going to fucking throw you over the railing like Edward did that Spriggs boy.”
Ed sucks air in through his teeth.
“I don’t think all that is necessary,” Stede says, then carefully plants his hand on Izzy’s shoulder, a touch that could be whatever the little man wants, whether that be platonic or affectionate, or perhaps a mysterious third thing. “Would you like to be in our relationship, Izzy?”
Izzy stands there for a long time. The rise and fall of his chest quickens as seconds zip into minutes. He grows gradually angrier, as far as Stede can tell, from the vein that bulges in his forehead to the clenched fists at his sides.
Then Edward speaks: “I’m sure Stede could show you a good time. Wait ‘til you fucking see that thing, Iz, you’re gonna love it.”
“I don’t just–” Izzy starts to say, then snaps his mouth shut like the words burst out of him of their own accord. Stede is a bit busy feeling himself boil at Edward’s words to encourage them out of him. Izzy's face twitches in irritation. “I’d want both.”
“Both, like–”
“Edward and I? That sort of both?” Stede cuts in.
“Yes, you fucking– yes. Edward and you.” Izzy looks between them, then around the main deck skeptically. The crew laugh with one another in the mess, none the wiser.
Seemingly satisfied, Izzy grabs Stede’s shirt sleeve. Stede struggles instinctively before it clicks that he’s being led somewhere. “Edward. Come along if you want.”
Izzy isn’t comfortable handling Edward. Stede feels his chest pang with sympathy. His eyes flick down to the foot the man never dares to lean his weight on. He still limps as he walks, winding through the hallways. Vaguely, as they pass, Stede thinks he might hear Jim and Oluwande enacting something similar in their cabin, but what his crew does behind closed doors is quite truly their business only.
The sound of boots confirms that Edward is following. Stede only tries not to faint.
A drumbeat pounds in Izzy’s chest as he throws open the door to Stede’s cabin. The door slams and the few books from Bonnet's restarted collection clatter to the floor.
The idiot’s still got the candles of his chandelier lit. Izzy can ignore the fire hazard. He’s glad to be able to see; most of the ship is plunged into darkness, lit only by the lanterns strung in corridors.
Behind them, Izzy knows, is Edward. He hadn’t the nerve to tug him along as he does Bonnet, who has been extremely fucking obvious about the requital of Izzy’s desire.
“You have been so–” Izzy throws Stede against an empty shelf, a hefty weight to hurtle around, but he goes, grunting as his back hits its corner, “-fucking frustrating.”
Stede bristles, straightening back up like he’ll switch them around. Hands push Izzy right into Stede and his anger dissipates. He knows it’s Ed without needing anything but the sense of touch. He’d know Ed’s touch even if his whole body was numb. Stede titters, visibly nervous, still fucking handsome.
“Hello,” he says feebly, then straightens again. “Would you– um. Might I–”
“Spit it out, Bonnet.”
“Oh, don’t be bitchy, Iz,” Ed scolds, then his hands are gone from Izzy. “You want to go back to your cabin?”
Izzy inwardly seethes at the concept that Ed’s about to send him back to his room like he’s some petulant child and not a grown man, several years Edward’s elder. He shows as little of this anger as possible and says, “No, Edward.”
“Then play nice,” Ed mutters, rubbing his hands up Izzy’s back. His touch leaves gooseflesh in its wake. Izzy nods at Stede because it’s clear what he’s asking for, but Edward clicks his tongue in disapproval. “He hasn’t even asked you yet. Go on, Stede. What do you want?”
Another set of hands settle on Izzy’s hips, clad in the same gloves Ed used to wear all the time, and Izzy thinks he might be able to feel their warmth seeping through layers of leather, right into his skin, reaching his heart. “May I kiss you, Izzy?”
“Be a bit fucking cross if you didn’t.” Izzy’s mouth twitches at Edward’s warning look. “Fuck sake– yes, Stede, you can kiss me.”
“Well, I know I can, which is why I was asking if I may –”
“Christ–”
The hands fully clad in leather push Izzy closer, landing Stede’s hands right over his ass, his lips the dock at which Izzy’s land, ungracefully slotting them together as Stede’s sound of alarm gets drowned in the contact. Stede clutches at Izzy’s ass and kisses him properly. He kisses like Ed does, with a slow start that builds for impending tragedy, presses that seem chaste until that agonizing bit of tongue swoops in and erodes Izzy’s aching knees into dust.
“Fuck, you two look good,” Ed says with an air of reverence in his voice. Izzy peeks open an eye, just to get a glimpse, but he doesn’t expect Edward to be palming himself the way he is. “Don’t look at me, Iz. Focus on him.”
In protest, Izzy pulls back entirely. Stede frowns, lips shining in the chandelier light. Izzy can’t believe he still has the fucking chandelier lit.
“Izzy, you’ve been fucking ogling at him every time I’ve watched you spar. Don’t even act like you’re just tolerating this,” Edward admonishes. He gestures to the bed nook. “Room for three in that thing, I swear it. Why don’t we go and you could show us some gratitude?”
“Gratitude?!” Izzy repeats, affronted. “Why the fuck should I–”
Again, a hand reaches Izzy’s back, but it also reaches around and holds Stede’s waist. Edward begins guiding them to the bed; despite himself, Izzy limps along with it, starting at the buttons of his vest. “Because you looked at Stede like he was something you could never have and here I am, giving him to you, so why don’t you fucking take it and be fucking grateful.”
“It’s not all that I want,” Izzy protests, even as he starts unlacing his leathers hastily. Stede is beside him, hands sort of hovering at his breeches like he started to take them off and got distracted watching Izzy. Izzy kicks him in the ankle and tips his head violently toward Stede’s crotch. Only then do his hands twitch back into action.
“Yeah? You greedy, Iz? What else do you want?” Edward asks. Fucker ought to know what he wants by now, but it’s obvious he wants Izzy to say it. Izzy nudges his boots off.
“Want you too,” he answers, trying to fend off his instinct to buck when the reins are grabbed at.
“Yeah, you said,” Edward teases, showing a bit of mercy by undoing the button on his leathers, but then fucking stopping, even as Izzy slips his own down his thighs. Stede’s hands are, again, idle at the hem of his shirt. Izzy wants to tear the fucking thing off of him, but he only scoffs loud enough for Stede to get the idea to stop fucking staring. “Want me how, Izzy?”
“Want you to fuck me,” Izzy mutters, jerking his arm and sending his vest to the floorboards.
“I wanted–” Stede cuts off. “I would– I– Um.”
“Don’t worry, Stede,” Ed rumbles, pulling Izzy forward by the hair. Izzy’s breath lodges somewhere in his throat, like a stone catching in the rudder. “He’s got two holes. Ain’t that right, Iz?”
As if to prove his point, Ed closes the space that remains between them. Izzy hopes right then that the ship gets blown to hell. He knows that as of his last check some hours before, there are no threats in their path, but with Edward’s lips on his, it'd be a merciful death. He moans as he imagines them decaying together.
“Did you want to fuck him, Stede?” Ed purrs when they part. He pushes Izzy onto the bed. Stede makes a choked-off sound. Izzy could protest at the prospect of not having Ed inside him how he used to, but he thinks he can settle for Bonnet and whatever horrifically big dick he’s got tenting his breeches. “I think he’d like that. Look at him.”
The weight of their attention makes Izzy’s stomach swoop.
“Come on,” Ed grabs at himself through his leathers, “you can suck my dick, can’t you?”
Of course, he can. Of fucking course. His tongue dries, weighted and unmoving.
“He can,” Stede affirms once Izzy nods his head jerkily. “Look, he’s nodding his head at you, Ed. That means this is fine, yes?”
“Mm,” Ed hums, dissatisfaction palpable in the lightness of the sound. His palm slides over Izzy’s shaven jaw. His thumb rubs up through the coarse, graying hair of his goatee, pressed to his lower lip. “He’s too obedient sometimes. Hard to tell when he really wants something.”
“Edward,” Izzy seethes.
“Well.” Stede pushes his breeches down his thighs, smalls with them. His cock swings free. It’d be comical if Izzy didn’t shift at the sight. It’s thick, fattened up with arousal, flushed a plummy rubicund along its base. Izzy prays that Stede’s near full mast. “Speak now or forever hold your peace, Izzy.”
Unspeaking, Izzy kicks his boots off ungracefully. He listens in satisfaction as they slam into a stupid fucking accent table and jostles its baubles, some clattering to the floor. Stede, surprisingly, doesn’t even seem to notice his precious plundered bullshit fall. His eyes rest solely on Izzy’s semi, lying in neglected interest at his thigh.
The moment Izzy manages to ease his leathers down past his bad foot, he’s flinging them, too. Edward takes the initiative by shoving him back and joining him on the bed. Izzy’s been so focused on having Stede’s attention that he didn’t even notice the coconut oil was retrieved until a slick coating of it is drizzled along his crack callously.
“Edward, fuck–” Izzy sucks in a sharp breath as Ed pushes through the tight tension and slips a finger inside to the first knuckle until Izzy’s too tight to permit any movement. He considers asking Ed to slow down, but his impatience wins out. His eyes are stuck on the sight of Stede stroking himself to full mast. He’s taken Ed, and Ed’s pretty big, but Stede must put him to shame any day.
“Loosen up, man,” Ed jokes, slowly moving the one finger he’s managed to get in through the constricting force of Izzy’s tense body. Izzy tries to breathe, but it catches somewhere along the way because Stede’s stripping down the rest of the way with his cock at what Izzy can only presume to be complete attention. The fop’s a fucking vision, even without the clothes. “‘M serious, Izzy. You’ll take hours at this rate.”
“Try and finger me for hours and I’ll rip your fucking arm off,” Izzy threatens weakly.
“Like to see you try,” Ed murmurs, but he does slip another finger in. Relaxing becomes a lot easier, then, not because of the extra stretch, but because Stede wraps his soft, agonizing hands around Izzy’s cock. It’s a hot, molten pleasure that makes his bones melt and his cock seep precome steadily within minutes.
“Edward,” Stede whines, starting to peel off Ed’s layers because he’s an impatient, needy, entitled, silver-spooned, lap-of-luxury-having bitch. Izzy wants to kiss him so badly that he shakes with it. “Hurry.”
“What, you want him to feel like a fucking vice?”
Stede makes a face, considering, eyes on the furled muscle of Izzy’s hole where Ed’s trying to press in another.
Ed laughs, drowning out Izzy’s gasp as a third squeezes its way in. “Nah, mate, you won’t last a fucking second in there.”
With a groan, Stede concedes, but he catches Ed’s mouth in the meantime. Izzy is left to watch as his Captains make out. His attention wavers as Edward’s cock is taken in Stede’s hand outside of the leathers this time, but the moan ripped from Edward is enough to bring him back to the sight of them making out, obscenely sloppy.
They finally part once Ed slips his fingers free, but Stede’s grip on Izzy’s prick has gone slack, so he’s left thrusting uselessly, his up-and-back strategy becoming quickly humiliating once there aren’t fingers to fuck back onto.
“Should be ready for you, Stede,” Ed states. His tone is comfortable in a way that’s almost conversational, if not for his panted breaths through kiss-swollen lips. He turns to Izzy, a wicked grin on his face. “You’ll be grateful I took my time. Looks big, but it feels even bigger on the inside.”
At the thought of his Captain being buggered by Stede, Izzy’s cock jumps in Stede’s floppy hand. He curls his fingers into a tighter grip, seemingly emboldened by it, because he then sneers, “You like the idea of that, don’t you, Israel?”
Izzy groans, his head swimming. He clutches the garish bedding that acts as a nest for his trembling body.
“Oh,” Ed breathes, “Watch it, Stede. He likes that.”
“Does he?” Stede’s tone is curious like Izzy’s a spectacle to be captivated with, the same tone Edward once used when he took Izzy apart. Stede shifts forward, taking Ed’s place, then hums in dissatisfaction. “This… will not work.”
Instead of just asking Izzy to move like a sane man, Stede seizes him by the ankles and yanks him away from the pillows until the backs of his thighs slap into him. Izzy’s still reeling as Stede flips him over onto his stomach and forcibly lifts his ass in the air by the hips.
“Fuckin’ hell, mate,” Edward says. He shifts around, taking the place at Izzy’s front where his lips hang open in a whorish instinct he didn’t know he still possessed after his dry spell. He can’t decide who to look at, so he shuts his eyes.
That turns out to be a mistake because Stede, with no forewarning, starts rubbing the blunt head of his cock over Izzy’s hole, then pushes minimally. It pops inside without any more effort. Izzy whips his head around. Stede’s lip is bitten into his mouth, brow furrowed in focus, as he holds himself and pushes the rest of the way in.
His ogling is interrupted by a ferocious tug of his hair, guiding him back around to where his Captain impatiently waits. He’s kneeling, legs spread as wide as the bed allows, and his cock stands proudly right at mouth level. Somehow, all Izzy manages is, “Your knee.”
“Fuck are you on about my knee for?” Ed chastises. “Just– Izzy, it’ll be fine, just–”
A thrust from Stede, startling in force and speed, sends noisy Izzy forward, lips crashing over the tip of Ed’s cock. It’s just barely a miss. Ed’s cock leaks over his cheek, right where he’s inked in Edward’s signature, a promise of devotion. Izzy is rendered speechless by the feeling of Stede’s dick splitting him open, so he can’t make any complaint, even as Ed pushes forward slightly. He smears pre over his face like a new brand of possession.
“Sorry,” Stede says sheepishly, not looking sorry even remotely when Izzy turns to see his hungry, rubicund face, nor is he acting it the way he keeps rutting forward like it’d kill him to fucking wait a minute for Izzy to get used to the girth of him.
“Yeah, right,” Izzy mutters, finding it in him to be bitter despite the coiling pleasure in his gut. He parts his lips for Ed’s cock when it presses to his mouth, but he doesn’t turn, caught in watching Stede bring a hand up to his beard, moaning softly into the back of as he gives slow, rolling thrusts of his hips.
“Edward, I’m– oh– I’m afraid you were right,” Stede sighs after a minute of gradually building the pace into something quicker. His hair has fallen askew into his face from where he loosely tied it with the thigh string, blonde strands frizzy with humidity.
“Don’t give out now, Stede,” Ed says, but his tone sounds more disappointed than commanding; weirdly, Stede only moans at this, loudly. His hand really muffles squat. “You don’t want to come watching him choke on my load?”
Izzy almost chokes just from the fucking vulgarity of it all, actually, but he saves face and tries to disguise it as a hum of eagerness. Because he is pretty fucking eager, after all, cockhead dripping onto the goddamn linens without so much as a brush of pinky.
“Okay, I’m sold, you’ve– oh– got me, just–” Stede’s thrusts slow to a completely unwarranted stop. Izzy feels frustration pulse hot in his core, even as Ed carries on with his thrusts, and he gives a few perfunctory pushes back to try and get Stede to keep fucking going without having to ask. Stede only makes this broken, heavy sound, then pleads, “Just a minute, Israel. I’m not trying to– um. Well.”
“To come too fast,” Ed supplies. Izzy finally tears his eyes away from Bonnet’s pathetic expression and is startled by the carnal look in Ed’s eyes, even when he knows the look well. The man’s fucking welded from pure sex, from the drape of his long, minx lashes to the self-indulgent, leisurely drags of his cock over Izzy’s tongue.
In another minute, Stede finally croaks out, “Alright.”
“Alright?” Ed echoes, smirking, but his eyes don’t leave Izzy’s, and Izzy’s don’t leave his.
“Alright,” Stede repeats like a confirmation, then starts back up with a brutal, quick pace that pushes the air from Izzy’s lungs in a long moan that drops his mouth open wider. Ed chuckles like he’s in awe of what he’s witnessing. Izzy can’t blame him. The debasement of it all, being on his hands and knees for Stede fucking Bonnet, of all men.
All of his qualms fade out though because Stede finally gives him back the fist around his cock. There’s more passion in the way he twists and tugs in rhythm and after weeks of wanting exactly this, Izzy’s fucking barreling up to his peak, his knees and arms shaking as he struggles to hold himself up with it.
“Don’t fucking fall,” Ed warns him. The rough snaps of his hips leave his cockhead near triggering Izzy’s gag reflex with each upstroke, but then Bonnet’s dick is there to distract him entirely. His hand, too, is working goddamn magic on him. Each twist of his wrist that edges on too rough drives Izzy closer, even as he tries to ignore it.
“He feels- amazing,” Stede tells Edward like he’s fucking commentating. Izzy somehow feels fluttery and floaty about it anyway, though, and tries to slide his eyes to look at Stede. It somewhat works: the crown of golden hair and the pale pink arm with a hint of muscle are visible in his periphery, only for Edward to tug him back to focusing on him.
“You hear, Iz?” Ed stares down into Izzy like he can see his fucking soul behind his eyes. Izzy doesn’t think he’d mind that, but that’s probably the two dicks getting to his brain. “You feel amazing. You’re amazing.”
That is beyond praise from his Captain. That is praise from Edward, the words Izzy’s organs hold out for, the tender gratitude that Izzy’s been yearning for all this time, that Izzy could break his bones to prove himself worthy of. That does it.
Stede Bonnet, overconfident but often within his right, capitalizes on this. He fucks him harder as he shoots hot into his hand, then starts a litany of praise, emphatic and effusive like he’s just had a goddamn epiphany: “You’re exquisite, Izzy, work so hard, take us so well– Oh, God, oh, my God!”
“Gonna come before I do, Stede?” asks Ed. There’s a hint of disappointment in his voice that makes Izzy’s hair raise even as he’s actively shaking between them and spilling the remnants of his orgasm into Stede’s palm.
“I can feel him pulsing, Edward,” Stede strains, his words spoken through gritted teeth. Even with his eyes shut, Izzy can visualize his face perfectly: similar to when he’d gotten stabbed, all contorted with an intense, overwhelming rush of feeling, creased from the effort of holding back from his orgasm for Edward’s sake. His face is even redder than before, his irises that shone different colors in the sun are eclipsed by dilated pupils, and his hair has got to be a right mess with all the sweat and movement.
“Well if Izzy wouldn’t– slack off–” Edward cups his hands over the back of Izzy’s head, thrusting to his finish, but Izzy’s far from able to hollow his cheeks. His whole body feels like lead between them, skin tingling from what might just be the air on sweat-damp skin, but what he feels, irrationally, is just from this sick thing, this love. “Fuck!”
Before Ed can try and pull out, come on his face, Izzy bobs his head forward down to the hilt. He lets Ed’s cock shoot hot down his throat, relaxing everything. He swallows each pulse, drinking him down with his head blank. Stede’s thrusts push him forward, deeper, and Izzy strains to hear the grunts and moans of his Captains over the roaring blood in his ears.
“Oh, fuck!” Stede shouts. Most of his weight topples over Izzy as he fucks him, hands grasping and seizing his hips for purchase. “Izzy, I’m– oh, dear, Israel!”
Stede’s cries are the only warning for the sudden torrent of hot, thick come that Izzy distantly feels filling him up. He’s somewhere far away, where all he can focus on through the frustration and affection is the drive of cock in one hole, then the other.
“Oh, dear,” Stede breathes like he’s getting his rocks off just watching. Izzy moans around Ed in reply, who hisses and pulls a fistful of Izzy’s hair, yanking him off of his cock. Of all things, that almost chokes him, but he coughs himself back to rights, flushed. “Well done, Izzy.”
“Fuck off, Bonnet,” Izzy responds. His voice gives on the words, hoarse from the rough use of his throat. He tries to clear it, but it’s futile; when he next speaks to thank his Captains, it’s a ragged “thank you.”
“How polite,” Stede murmurs, but Izzy only groans in response, feeling wrung out as a bar rag. He looks around with bleary eyes for his clothes because somehow, he can still feel there’s a chance of this going sideways, of him secretly being unwanted for anything more than a hole to dump a load in. He sits up, skin prickling as he feels come leak from him.
“Where are you going, Israel?”
Izzy doesn’t need to turn around to see the frown on Stede’s face.
“To my cabin, I presume.”
“Oh,” Stede says softly. Izzy doesn’t look. “Alrighty, then.”
“Fucking Christ-” Ed grumbles, then Izzy’s pulled down onto the bed. Stede’s spend smears into his thighs as they slap together. “All that fuckin’ preamble about us doing shit to your brain and now you’re goin’? Tell you what, Iz–”
Izzy almost doesn’t hear what Ed says next. His head floats off somewhere else because Ed presses his lips to Izzy’s cheek. It’s tender and it’s soft and Izzy struggles to feel like he deserves it at all, especially from Edward, who he’s spat vitriol in the face of more times than he can count, even with all nineteen digits of his body. But he does hear it.
“I need you here.”
It’s unmooring, even as he remains rooted in place, the same way he was before when Edward spoke those words and called for Izzy to heel at his side. Stede fills Izzy’s silence. “Trust that he does. Please. Sorry, dearest, but I don’t know how many nights of pretending to be Izzy I can bear.”
“Me fucking neither,” Ed says pointedly. Stede’s eartips tinge pink.
“Jesus,” Izzy sputters at the divulgence.
“Like He, I sacrifice for love,” Stede agrees solemnly, meeting Izzy’s eyes.
A myriad of retorts rise in Izzy’s throat, but he says nothing against it, even if he does laugh quietly at the joke. Stede’s gaze sweetens into saccharinity; Izzy has to look away.
He doesn’t respond to Edward, either, though he feels the distinct feeling of something going unanswered hanging in the air. Edward audibly isn’t breathing. He lets the gradual repose of his body in their arms speak for him. He communicates through the press of his lips to Edward’s hand, a gesture far soppier than anything he’d usually indulge in.
There’s a breath behind him on the shell of his ear, rough like it was punched out. Izzy smiles into the warm, inked skin and holds it closer before turning to face him with a quiet sound of protest from Stede.
Under the soothing patterns Edward’s drawing into his hip, the soft breaths of Stede against his neck, he can feel each muscle relax like a loosened line unspooling once no longer tethered to masts.
On either side of him, there are delicate brushes of lips, butterfly kisses from his Captains over his skin where grisly scars and coarse hair mar any beauty that might’ve been there when he was a boy. With the twilight blackness and shut door keeping him hidden, Izzy luxuriates in it all, humming contentedly and shutting his eyes as they smother him in their affection.
When he wakes, they’re still there.
In a flurry of rose-pink flushed skin and goopy honey brown eyes, Izzy’s sandwiched between their hungry hands, their seductive smiles. He’s faced just how fucking much he loves both of them. They rouse together with bronze hips snapping and skin slaps loudening from the Captain’s cabin. The crew eyes Izzy strangely. Izzy doesn’t give a fuck.
At sunset, with a mischievous sparkle in his eye, Stede marches down from the quarterdeck to Izzy. He twirls his favored sword, bedazzled with gemstones, around his fingers, its masterful wielder. A smile, one that must echo Izzy’s growing smirk, cuts into his handsome features as his blade does the air.
“I’d like to see you best me in a duel, Izzy,” he declares imperiously. He grips his sword tighter, fingerless leather gloves creaking.
Despite it all - the din of gossip as their smiles widen, hushed whispers that splash together to form an ocean of voices, the pretense of feeling no fondness withering under vulnerability worn like armor - Izzy unsheathes his preferred rapier.
“Do your worst, Bonnet.”