A Line In The Sand: Deleted Scenes
Scene 7: How Will Turner Learnt Victoria Was Dead

Elizabeth's face fell as she saw her father standing so grave and silent at the window of their drawing room. She put a hand on Will's arm and a quick frown told him to stay where he was.

"Father, is everything all right?"

"Captain Trimble, a merchant, just delivered this letter. He also delivered this."

Governor Swann picked up a sword from the small table by the window and turned to face his daughter and her fiancé, holding it flat on his open palm.

"That's Norrington's!" Will said, starting forward to snatch it out of the Governor's hand. He brought it up close to his face, studying the filigree. "I would know that work anywhere – Victoria slaved over it."

"The letter, Father," Elizabeth said, her heart thumping so hard it seemed to echo in her ears. "You said there was a letter."

"It is James Norrington's resignation."

"And what mention does it make of Victoria?" Will asked, lowering the sword.

"There is no mention," Governor Swann raised his hands and let them drop helplessly. "I'm sorry, my boy, he doesn't mention her."

"He must!" Will dropped the sword on the sofa, heedless of his workmanship and took the offered letter. "She is with him, I know it! If he survived that hurricane, she must have too – she must have!"

Will scanned the letter desperately, but he found no mention of his sister in the dry formalities. Elizabeth's soft hands guided him to a chair and he sank into it, feeling the heat seep out of his body and gooseflesh rise along his arms.

"He would have mentioned her, Will," Elizabeth said. "So she can't have gone with him."

"And where else would she have gone?" Will demanded, speaking sharply to Elizabeth for the first time. "She would not have left for anyone else. And she left the morning he sailed."

"Perhaps she is with another sailor. We still have not heard from Lieutenant Gillette," Governor Swann offered. "There is every chance she is safe with him."

The letter slipped from Will's hands and Elizabeth knelt at his side. She picked the letter up, glanced at it and cast it aside. Something in Will started up suddenly in accusation.

"I ought to have known if she… I ought to have felt it… But I have been so busy with the wedding plans and the blacksmiths and I trusted her good sense…"

"Why shouldn't you trust her good sense?" Elizabeth asked gently. "She has always been sensible and she is as able a swordsman as you. You could not have predicted this."

"She is my sister. I ought to have worried more. I ought to have gone after her the moment I found she had gone."

"And she would not have come back with you," Elizabeth said firmly. "She was not as confident as you or I in defying the Commodore. You know as well as I do that she has always nursed an unswerving loyalty to him."

This was the first time that Will's instincts had been voiced aloud. He had always ignored the way Victoria would defend the Commodore against his sharp humour, the way she would be full of what the Commodore had said, or the book he was going to lend her. He had certainly never paused to consider who came first for her - himself or James Norrington.

"A loyalty he has never returned," Will answered, hating Norrington more powerfully than he had ever done in his life. "He ought never to have let her aboard."

"Will, my boy, I hardly think it likely that Commodore Norrington knew she was aboard. Perhaps that is why there is no mention of her."

Will didn't answer for a long while, allowing Elizabeth to slip her hands into his and hold them tightly. She felt slightly nauseous, as though she ought to have known that this would happen, as though she ought to have warned Will that his sister would follow Norrington. She had seen that expression of lost hope on Victoria's face when she had accepted James's proposal.

"Will, I am so sorry."

"We will postpone the wedding," Will said. "We must."

"Of course," Elizabeth nodded and reached up to wrap her arms around him.

Something about Elizabeth's femininity, the long skirts, the upsweep of her hair, reminded Will that he had lost the companion he had known all his life. His sister, who had glowered at Brown for his sake, who had followed him to save Elizabeth, who had helped his hatch his plan for Jack's escape. The girl who sparred with him and pushed him hard so that he improved. The tears started into his eyes and he clutched at Elizabeth as her father slipped silently from the room, picking up the letter and sword.

One of the first questions Bootstrap Bill Turner asked his son was answered with a lie in as cheery a voice as Will could manage.

"And your sister? How is she?"

"Fine. Beautiful. Safe."

The End.