all islands in a common sea

JACK

Flora's mind drifts and Jack's, in comparison, is utterly and blessedly blank of all but the most vibrant sparks of her thoughts, leaving him feeling untethered but strangely grounded all at once. He smirks against her throat at the warning he can feel rising to the surface even before it leaves her lips, the captain loosening his grip on her just enough that when she collapses into the blankets, she takes him along as well, leaving them both sprawled in the plush sheets.

His hands are more than a mere echo on her body, calloused fingertips strumming up the side of her body while his other arm tucks beneath the pillow supporting her head; evidently Jack has no intention of trying to totter around belowdeck right now either. "I rate that as good as the Greatwood, if not better," he mutters, voice rough and still fairly distracted.

you're the last of a dying breed; write our names in the wet concrete
I wonder if your therapist knows everything about me

Code stolen from Queen Sky

Flora

Her thoughts sink low and warm, curling in on themselves like sun-drunk petals at the decision he’s made to stay. It takes almost nothing to fall into him, the weight and heat of his body an anchor she can mould herself around without thinking. Every pass of his fingertips along her side is a quiet lightning strike; small, deliberate, enough to set a shiver moving through her without breaking the languid stretch of her muscles. The sensation lingers in her mind like a spark catching in dry grass, brightening before it fades, only for the next touch to set it alight again.

"Is that so?" Her voice is soft, roughened at the edges from use, the words slipping easily into the quiet between them. The memory of Molly’s swells up vivid and hot, the taste of it still sweet in her mouth even after so many seasons. A smile tugs at her lips, slow and certain, and she lets the scene spill out through her thoughts. "Mmm, maybe.." she says with a sly grin. "But I doubt anything could top what we got up to at Molly’s."

Her head tips just enough to catch him from the corner of her eye, the grin sharpening as mischief catches hold. "I was always pretty sure you nearly said you loved me after you came that second time." The tease is velvet-edged and it melts into a quiet snort of laughter, her shoulders shifting with the movement.

I trace the evidence, make it make some sense
why the wound is still bleedin'

Code stolen from Queen Sky

JACK

"Mm, that is so," Jack confirms, happy to hitch a ride along Flora's daydreams for as long as she lets her mind wander. He huffs an amused breath against the back of her neck as the flush of Molly's surfaces in her memory, the captain raising his eyebrows and shifting just enough to glance down at her properly, as if wondering whether she expects a repeat performance of that - or in general - any time soon. (He's magic, but he's not a miracle worker).

"Much as Molly's was great exercise, we both know I had to wait for somethin' more dramatic for that to happen," he says, voice low and laced with amusement. Dying and returning to tell the tale about it is the sort of thing that tears an I love you from Jack Barclay's lips, as Flora now knows all too well. "Shame we never went back a second time." To Molly's, he means.

you're the last of a dying breed; write our names in the wet concrete
I wonder if your therapist knows everything about me

Code stolen from Queen Sky

Flora

Flora twists in the sheets, the motion unhurried and lazy. If Jack had it in him, she’d have taken him again right there with no hesitation, especially with the ghost of leather snapping still in her ears, the sound braided with the memory of his voice telling her to touch herself the way he would. It lingers like smoke, curling into the edges of her thoughts.

A quiet snort escapes her lips, softened by the affectionate roll of her eyes, though the warmth in it undercuts any sharpness. "And here everyone thinks I was the dramatic one in this relationship," she mumbles dryly.

At the mention of Molly’s, she shifts again, turning until she’s stretched out on her back beside him, the bedding a lazy sprawl around her limbs. Her mind keeps itself contained, or at least it tries to. She shrugs, the movement slow, casual, though it’s impossible to hide the pulse beneath it. "With the Family gone," she says, her gaze catching his, "Stormbreak’s back open for business, so..."

I trace the evidence, make it make some sense
why the wound is still bleedin'

Code stolen from Queen Sky

JACK

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves - you were," Jack is quick to clarify, his lips curling in a sly smile as he shifts enough for her to roll onto her back, the captain stretching out in the sheets as if to give his sore muscles a chance to properly relax for a moment. "I just learned a few tricks from you is all. I taught you how to sail an' you taught me the merits of bein' dramatic at the right time." See, a fair exchange of skills.

He hears Flora's suggestion before she ever says it out loud, Jack's smile growing into something wolfish as he glances across at her. "So maybe I'll find myself back up there one of these days. Maybe I'll go walk through the Silk Houses for a bit, since it's been so long. Who knows what familiar faces I'll bump into while I'm up there."

you're the last of a dying breed; write our names in the wet concrete
I wonder if your therapist knows everything about me

Code stolen from Queen Sky

Flora

Flora scrunches her nose, huffing out the kind of breath that concedes the point without surrendering entirely. "Fiiiiiiiiine," she says, dragging it out just long enough to make it petty, "what I meant was everyone always thought I was the only dramatic one." Her eyes flick to his, the grin that follows sharp enough to gleam but softened by the quiet laugh that slips through. "Glad I could teach you something," she comments breezily.

At the rest, her brows lift, the corner of her mouth curving as something warmer than she wants to examine coils low in her chest. Gods, it’s far too easy to slip back into this rhythm with him, too easy to forget all the reasons they'd been pulled apart in the first place. She shakes her head, nudging her shoulder into him like she’s physically shoving the thought aside. "Absolutely not," she says, smirk deepening. "If you’re heading that way, you can damn well tell me. Waiting to bump into you in Torchline’s one thing…" She tilts her chin, voice dipping into mock warning. "…but I’m not wandering the streets of Stormbreak on the off chance of finding you."

I trace the evidence, make it make some sense
why the wound is still bleedin'

Code stolen from Queen Sky

JACK

"Eh, you taught me more'n one thing. But the drama is the one everyone else has to suffer," Jack concedes, flashing her a quick grin. The other stuff - the stuff that has made him softer beneath the surface than he's ever been before, the stuff that lets him give grace where previously he'd have given little more than the back of his hand - that he keeps very much between them.

Scoffing a laugh at her refusal (which is just an acceptance with strings attached, and Jack's business brain can appreciate that sort of negotiation), he shifts at last to roll onto his front, tucking both arms beneath the pillow and sinking into it until only his eyes are properly visible. When he speaks, his voice is a touch muffled. "Aight, next time I'm on my way up to Stormbreak, I'll raise a Flora flag as we leave Torchline. How's that sound?"

you're the last of a dying breed; write our names in the wet concrete
I wonder if your therapist knows everything about me

Code stolen from Queen Sky

Flora

Flora knows full well the other things she’s taught him, but she keeps the gold from spilling too far, tucking it neatly into the corners of her mind before it can take root. Instead, she rolls her eyes in a soft and unbothered way and gives a small shrug. "Good thing neither of us gives much of a shit what other people think, then."

She stays on her back while Jack folds himself into the bed, all angles settling into the plush until only that sharp, ocean-blue gaze remains above the softness. The shift of her shoulder brushes lightly against the arm he’s readjusted, and she bites at the inside of her lip to keep the grin from breaking loose. "Sounds good," she says, feigning casual as her brows lift. "What sort of flag, though? A flower would be way too obvious." Her head tilts, the slow curve of a smile betraying her thoughts. While there were all sorts of sexually suggestive fruits or items they might use—a peach, a pair of handcuffs—there was something utterly mundane that might just work. "Maybe a shoe?" It was, after all, a proposal of a certain type, if not the capital P kind.

I trace the evidence, make it make some sense
why the wound is still bleedin'

Code stolen from Queen Sky

JACK

Jack arches an eyebrow at that statement - he's quite sure Flora does, or at least used to care a great deal what everyone else thought, and if that has changed then perhaps he can add it to the list of wisdom he's imparted on her. Still, he makes no mention of it, instead casting his mind to the sort of signal he might send that Flora would be able to recognise without it screaming booty call.

"A shoe?" His laughter is sudden, muffled by the pillow but no less genuine for it, Jack shrugging his shoulder as if it's a decent suggestion. "I'd never get a flag with a shoe on it, fuck that. I'd string up one of Bassian's boots instead, but you'd prob'ly struggle to see it. Though I s'pose I could tie somethin' to it, like that feather boa you keep in that storage cupboard."

The one he'd seen when she'd gone looking for tools for him to check out the Sugar Tide whilst they'd been somewhat stranded in Eurybia.

you're the last of a dying breed; write our names in the wet concrete
I wonder if your therapist knows everything about me

Code stolen from Queen Sky

Flora

Flora’s laugh is soft and sharp all at once, curling in her chest before slipping past her lips. "If you used one of Bassian’s boots, he’d probably be even more curious about what exactly the Ark was meant to be signalling than if you just used a random new flag," she says, the words warm with mischief. The thought glitters through her mind, touched with the shimmer his laugh had left there, that golden thread winding through her without permission.

Her gaze tips toward the door, as if she might see all the way down the hall to that cupboard. "That boa wouldn’t last thirty seconds in rain or wind. And those feathers were hand-plucked from a dreambird, thank you very much." The image of it—tangled in rigging, shedding colour into the salt air with Bassian chaotically trying to collect the feathers—drifts through her thoughts, bright and absurd.

When her eyes find him again, they catch on the spray of tattooed flowers curling over his upper arm, the sight pulling a small, thoughtful shrug from her. "Maybe flowers would be fine, actually." Her aqua eyes glint with the suggestion, the corner of her mouth tilting upward. "You could just tell the crew I’d finally let the power go to my head and demanded the Ark fly my flag just to get back at you."

I trace the evidence, make it make some sense
why the wound is still bleedin'

Code stolen from Queen Sky

JACK

"Let him wonder. It'd be somethin' for him to do with his mind durin' the day - it ain't usually all that full," Jack says, his smirk hidden by the pillow; he doubts someone would even need his sort of magic to be able to guess that about Bassian either. "Oh, a dreambird? Perish the thought," he drawls, turning enough to follow her gaze down the hall, as if to either spy the fabled boa again for himself or to let his telepathy reach out for any nearby snags of thought.

Slouching back against the bed, on his back this time, Jack feathers a hand through his dark hair and finally feels the shreds of himself knit back together into something that resembles order. "Or," he says, "I could tell 'em nothin' at all. My ship, my banners. Ain't up to them what flies or why, an' there's enough superstition in Caido that they'll not even think to question it."

They haven't thus far, anyway. "Flowers it is. Let's hope your trip to the Cordillera is a quick one, mm?"

you're the last of a dying breed; write our names in the wet concrete
I wonder if your therapist knows everything about me

Code stolen from Queen Sky

Flora

Flora’s grin grows warm at Jack's digs toward Bassian, the affection in it impossible to hide. Her gaze slides back to him, lashes lowering before she widens her eyes in mock earnestness. "Yeah, and maybe one day you’ll even get to see me in it," she says, before her mind clarifies with feathers streaking across bare skin, barely veiling the curve of her breasts before tangling soft and wicked between her thighs.

The shift of his body draws her attention, and she exhales softly, reading the slow stretch of muscle as the reanimation that comes before departure. It’s for the best, she tells herself—better to cut the rendezvous short before one of them can ruin it—though gods, she’d happily tease the moment into the afternoon. Instead, her mouth curls into a smirk and she nods, voice light. "Far be it for me to tell you how to run your ship or what flags to fly."

Flora stretches, the motion all easy indulgence before she settles again, searching until she finds the sharp, familiar blue of his eyes. "I’ll keep an eye out on your masts, then." She hums, ignoring the golden spray of anticipation that gilds her thoughts.

As for the Cordillera, her smile returns, bright and sure. "I’m confident I can make it there and back," she says, pausing just long enough to let the smirk grow. "Especially now that my rigging has been thoroughly checked." A more cautious man might have checked it twice, but Flora wasn't about to complain.

I trace the evidence, make it make some sense
why the wound is still bleedin'

Code stolen from Queen Sky

JACK

"In it an' nothin' else if I'm lucky," Jack quips, just before those very images go dancing through his mind. With a sly half smile, he glances across at Flora and lets his eyes drag purposely over every bit of her, lingering on the very places she'd imagined the feathers might skim and tumble, before looking away again with a sigh. "Damn straight," he agrees of his ship and his flags. "I got enough on my hands between the Marins an' Bassian wantin' to come be your first mate every other day."

Rolling, at last, to sit up, the captain leans back on one hand and looks, for a second or two, as if he's considering simply relaxing back into the sheets for a few hours and drifting into a nap, but the thought is gone before it can properly take hold. "If I check your riggin' again you ain't gonna get outta here by tomorrow," he rumbles, his tone teasing as he shifts to get off the bed.

"I'll just have to give it a full once over when I see you in Stormbreak." Her ship, he means. Of course.

you're the last of a dying breed; write our names in the wet concrete
I wonder if your therapist knows everything about me

Code stolen from Queen Sky

Flora

Flora draws in a slow breath as his gaze sweeps over her, the weight of it sinking into her skin like heat from the sun; tangible, heavy, leaving a streak of something hot and electric in its wake. Gods, he made it look effortless, that talent for winding her up without lifting a finger, and she’s half inclined to smack him for it.

"Maybe you should let him," she says of Bassian, the shrug that comes with it loose and nonchalant. "So far the only other person I’ve flown with was Mateo, and he went out of his way to be zero help." The memory makes her lips twitch, a faint glimmer of amusement threading through her thoughts.

Flora tries not to seem like she’s holding her breath as Jack lingers, but when he finally moves, her exhale is quiet, almost a mental shake to pull herself back together. Rolling her eyes at his back, she lets a quip slip out, dry and edged with a smirk. "Bold boast," she murmurs, watching him stand before she pushes herself upright as well, shaking her head with a laugh that’s lighter than the heat still coiled low in her belly.

I trace the evidence, make it make some sense
why the wound is still bleedin'

Code stolen from Queen Sky