Forever Neverland

by Forever Neverland (epub)

  On impulse, she rushed forward and tried the handle. It was latched tight and wouldn’t budge. She made a frustrated sound that was drowned out by the next flash of electric light and peal of thunder. The ship rocked slowly to one side and real fear began to set in. She thought of her brothers – little Michael. Would Hook make certain the child was somewhere safe?

  The noises above were beginning to wane. The footfalls became fewer and far between. A few pirates shouted to one another and she could easily discern Hook’s booming voice above them all as he bellowed orders to his crew. She listened and made out a few terms. . . mizzen. . . brail. . . cables. . . .

  She could hear the hatches slamming shut and wooden bars being slid into place. The wind knocked grappling hooks and other metal things into the wood of the ship. It sounded like drums before a funeral.

  And then one series of knocking sounded louder than the others. More persistent and urgent. Wendy frowned and turned in the cabin, facing the windows.

  There at the glass was Peter, dressed in black, framed by a darkening, antagonized sky. His green eyes flashed in the next strike of lightning. He caught her gaze and pressed one hand to the glass, motioning for her to come over.

  Wendy rushed to the window and fought with the latch. After a few tries, the thick steel bolt slid open and Peter ripped the window open.

  “Hurry!” he hissed, glancing nervously toward the door to the cabin behind her. “We don’t have much time!”

  Wendy was more than surprised to see him and there were a thousand questions she wanted to ask him, but first from her lips was, “Peter! Are you okay? What happened to you?” She tried to keep her voice low, but excitement crept in around the edges and she could barely contain it.

  “I’m fine!” he whispered loudly, a frustrated note to his tone. “Please, Wendy! Come through the window!”

  She moved forward, but then hesitated. “No!” she told him, with a shake of her head. “Peter, I can’t! My brothers are down below; I can’t leave them!”

  “Forget them, Wendy! Hook won’t hurt them! Now come on!” He reached his hand through the open window and grabbed her by her upper arm, pulling her toward him. Wendy caught herself just as she would have run into the stained glass that lined the window on either side. Then she pulled back, jerking her arm out of his grasp.

  “No, Peter!” She’d given Hook her word. I promised I wouldn’t escape, she thought frantically. And, thus far, Hook had kept his part of the bargain. Shouldn’t she keep hers? If she left, what would the pirate captain do to Michael and John? “I can’t leave!”

  “The storm, Wendy!” He growled at her, motioning to the turmoil around them. “You can’t stay here; it’s too dangerous!”

  As she stepped back from the window, something red flared in the emerald depths of Peter’s eyes. Wendy gasped and blinked.

  And then Peter was sailing through the window to land on the wooden planks in front of her. Lightning flashed – and then flashed again. Thunder rocked the cabin. Something on Hook’s writing desk rattled ominously. Peter glanced in that direction and then settled his strange green gaze on Wendy once more.

  “I’m not going to argue with you, Wendy,” he told her, his tone low. “I’ve spent time on a ship in a storm; believe me it isn’t fun.” He shook his head, once. “I’m not leaving you here.” He took several steps toward her, but she hurriedly stepped back.

  “And I’m not going with you, Peter,” Wendy asserted in a tone just as low and determined. “I made a promise and I intend to keep it.”

  It was probably one of the most idiotic things she had ever done. If she’d had a lick of sense, surely she would have taken his hand and left the ship then and there. But she’d given Hook her word, and as the captain had said – a promise meant something. Especially to a pirate.

  She also couldn’t leave her brothers behind. Not now.

  Peter stood before her, a tall figure in mist-drenched black, his blonde hair dampened and darkened by the gathering storm. And Wendy suddenly felt a little shorter. That strange redness flashed in his eyes again. She wondered if she were imagining it. It reminded her of someone else. . . .

  Peter said nothing for what seemed like an eternity. He just stood there, his jaw set, his eyes sparking green and, sometimes, red. Wendy felt her resolve melting ever so slowly away. What would Peter do next?

  And then there was a noise at the door.

  Wendy whirled around to face it. When she did, she felt Peter’s arms wrap around her, quick and strong. Her own arms were trapped at her sides. His hand slid over her mouth to prevent the sounding of the scream that was already bubbling up inside of her.

  Before she could think to react in any intelligent or useful manner, Peter was lifting her off of her feet and sailing with her toward the open window. There was a hard shattering of glass as Peter used his leather-encased elbow to knock out the side panels, giving the two of them enough room to glide through.

  And then they were in the air and the wind was whipping around them, chaotic and cold. Wendy let loose with the scream that had been building, but it was effectively muffled by Peter’s hand. She had no pixie dust. There was nothing to catch her if she fell this time. The ship that sailed further and further below sported an empty deck. The sea around it churned angrily. The clouds whirled and rolled and spun overhead and the world was dizzying as it both sped away beneath her and loomed ever closer above.

  Wendy shut her eyes tight and, with every conscious fiber of her being, she willed Peter not to drop her.

  *****

  Hook slid the key into the door of his cabin just as the sound of shattering glass greeted him from beyond. He shoved the door open and stormed into the room.

  Wendy was gone.

  Wind whipped at his hair and scattered the papers and maps on his desk on the other side of the room. The lanterns swung hectically on their chains, their flames extinguished long ago. The cabin loomed around him, empty and foreboding.

  Anger flooded his system as it never had.

  He felt betrayed in that moment. And the pain it caused in his heart was worse than any he had ever known. It was worse, in fact, than the pain that Pan had dealt to him on that cursed night so many hundreds of years ago.

  Hook stood at the center of his whirlwind of a cabin, unmoving and uncaring of the cold and the rain that battered his tall form. He gazed at the open, ruined window and thought of Wendy’s promise.

  She lied.

  It was the worst thing a pirate could do to another pirate. Break a promise – go back on her word.

  But Wendy wasn’t a pirate, was she? He didn’t know why he’d thought of her in that way. How could he have expected her to remain here, with him, on this dangerously listing ship when she could flee to safety with –

  Peter Pan.

  So be it, he thought, his blue gaze hardening into ice. He knew where they would go. The only truly safe harbor in a storm.

  And he would meet them there.

  *****

  “Tiger Lily, look!” Great Big Little Panther stood and pointed to the two figures moving away from the pirate ship out on the storm-wrought cove. “It’s Peter! He’s carrying someone!”

  Tiger Lily frowned and shook her head. The wind blew sheets of rain into her eyes and she wiped them away, thanking her luck that she’d braided her hair before heading out earlier, or it would be whipping into her eyes as well.

  “No!” She shook her head. “That’s not Peter!” The boy they watched was too big. And he wasn’t dressed as Peter dressed.

  But he was flying. And only Peter and the Lost Boys flew. She narrowed her gaze and tried harder to make them out.

  “They’re headed toward Never Bird Mountain!” she yelled, as the flying figures shrank until they were swallowed by the dark, looming form of blue and black that marked the spire-like mountain that shadowed what the Lost Boys called Skull Rock and the ancient bones of the Never Bird that rested upon it.

  “It’s safe ground
!” Panther shouted, trying to be heard over a sudden gust of wind that whipped rain water into his face and mouth. He gave up on saying anything further and, instead, used hand signals to speak to his princess.

  Tiger Lily read the signals and signaled back with her own hands.

  Panther nodded. They would head to Skull Rock. But, first, they would make a stop in Pixie Forest. It never hurt to have fairies backing you up from behind.

  Chapter Eighteen

  When Peter finally let her go, it was to set her down, none too gently, on a rocky outcropping within the dark cavernous ruins inside of Skull Rock. She caught her balance on the slippery surface and then straightened and took the opportunity to catch her breath. She looked around the haunting cavern as Peter landed, graceful as ever, on a rock a few yards away.

  She watched him cross his arms over his chest as he waited for her to become accustomed to her surroundings. He, on the other hand, seemed to fit right in here, in this place as pitch as night. It was as if he had never left. Except that now, he was not the sprightly youth he once was, wrapped in clothes of leaves and vines, his hair mussed with salt spray, his face tan from playing in the sun.

  Now, his handsome face was pale as cold stone. It seemed drawn in the coming storm and the wake of his emotions, making him appear nearly ethereal in this otherworldly darkness.

  She tore her eyes from his and looked around, if for no other reason than to break herself free from his powerful gaze.

  She remembered this cave quite well. It was forever lit by torches that lined the walls and never seemed to burn out – even if doused. Their fire light reflected on the black water below, casting an eerie, dream-like pall over everything in the cavern.

  Peter and Hook had fought here five years ago. Hook had lost – after a battle of what seemed like epic proportions – and had fallen into the bottomless waters at the cavern’s center. While most sailors never bothered to learn to swim because they felt it would only prolong a death at sea, the captain of the Jolly Roger, by way of the exception that made the rule, was an excellent swimmer.

  He’d survived and they’d all met on the deck of the Jolly Roger for yet another battle the very next day.

  And now. . . . Now the cave seemed a hollow ghost of the battleground it once was. The fires still burned. But, even so, the vast stone cavern seemed constructed of echoes, the way memories are – and shadows of things that once were.

  Peter stood still on the stone opposite her and peered at her through flashing, piercing green eyes. “So what was it, then?” he asked her, his voice echoing in the cave exactly the way she remembered that it did.

  Wendy cocked her head to one side and glared at him through narrowed eyes. “What was what?” she asked him. She wished that he was closer so that she could use some of the martial arts training she had learned over the last five years and deck him for taking her on an unwilling flying trip once more.

  “What was it Hook offered in exchange for your promise not to leave the Jolly Roger?” He smiled a wry, mean smile and shook his head. “I suppose he made you an honorary pirate?” There was a hard edge to his tone, which was one of frank disgust.

  “As a matter of fact, that was the promise he made to my brothers. That,” she clarified, with a sharp lifting of her chin, “and sanctuary. He gave us food and drink and shelter and promised that no harm would come to any of us.”

  At that, Peter threw back his head and laughed. The sound echoed harshly off of the walls, ricocheting through the shadows like the laugh of a demon.

  “And you believed him.” He lowered his head and gazed at her through the tops of his now green-orange glowing eyes. “A pirate.” He spat the word. “What is that worth, exactly? The word of a pirate.”

  “Quite a lot actually,” Wendy found herself answering. They were the same words that Hook had spoken to her several days ago, when she’d first fallen onto the deck of the Jolly Roger.

  And now she found that she really did believe those words. For no harm had come to her or her brothers. In fact. . . . Hook had been nothing but a gentleman to her.

  “He’s treated me better than you have, Peter,” she whispered, lowering her gaze to look away from him and into the dark, reflective water. Outside, lightning split the sky and thunder rolled in to hammer against the walls of the cavern.

  At the entrance of the cave, a particularly high wave crashed with more force than the others had. The tide was rising and the wind was becoming dangerous. It whipped through the cavern, causing the flames to dance maniacally on the ends of their torches.

  But Peter’s thoughts must not have been on the storm. Because he flew off of the rock he’d been standing on and once more picked Wendy up, carrying her up to the very same landing that they’d stood on five years ago, when he’d first rescued Tiger Lily from Hook’s men and Wendy had judiciously untied her.

  It was higher than the other rock and safer from the rising tide.

  Again, Peter dropped her, and this time, she fell to the ground with a painful thump, landing on her back. Peter followed her down until he was kneeling over her, his hands braced on the ground at either side of her head.

  “So, the good Captain turned on the charm for you, did he?” he hissed, his face hovering just inches above her own. “I seem to recall that you’re rather good at falling for that act of his, aren’t you, Wendy?” He pushed himself up and away from her and stood. Then he put his hand under his chin and pretended to be thinking. “Now let me see if I can remember what happened the last time he convinced you he was more than a blood-thirsty bandit. . . .” He dropped his hand in mock surprise. “Oh yes! I know now! He tricked you into leading him straight to our hideout, where he ambushed us and nearly killed us all!”

  Wendy’s vision turned slightly red. “That’s it!” She brought her legs underneath her and shoved herself up. Peter backpedaled as she quickly rose and turned to face him head-on. “You spoiled, narrow-minded, immature, obnoxious, little boy!” She felt her hands curling into fists at her sides and wondered how much longer she could hold off before using them.

  *****

  A hundred feet away, in the sheltering shadow of a few large, black boulders, Princess Tiger Lily and her large companion watched the goings-on with mounting concern.

  “You’re right,” Tiger Lily whispered with a shake of her head. “It is Peter.” She frowned. “But he’s changed so much. . . ..”

  “He’s grown,” whispered Great Big Little Panther. His eyes were as large as his name; he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. “He promised he would never grow up.”

  “What do you think they’re saying?” Tiger Lily asked. She didn’t understand English – had never learned it. She hadn’t needed to because Peter always spoke her tribe’s language when they needed to communicate.

  “I don’t know, but that’s Wendy,” Panther replied, his eyes widening even further as he realized that the young woman Peter was arguing with was none other than a grown-up version of the twelve-year-old girl that had visited Neverland five years ago.

  “By the spirit of the Never Bird!” Tiger Lily quietly exclaimed. “You’re right again!” It was the Wendy Bird, the one who had been shot down by the Lost Boys five years ago. Wendy was the first and only girl Lost Boy Peter had ever brought to Neverland.

  And she too had grown.

  A tiny chiming sound distracted Tiger Lily and she pulled away from the rock to look behind her. The pixie lookout was waiting down below, hiding out of sight so that his shimmering light could not be detected by anyone. Three more pixies waited outside, ready for the signal that their help was needed.

  The look-out fairy was waving at Tiger Lily now. She squinted at him, trying to make out his hand signals.

  Then her eyes widened, just like Panther’s. “It’s Hook,” she said. “He’s here.”

  *****

  Tinkerbell hovered, unseen, in the eye socket of the ancient, massive boulder known as Skull Rock. Down below, in the orange glow cast
by the two-dozen torches that lined the interior of massive stone, Peter and Wendy were fighting. She could hear the entire exchange, despite the mounting gale, and dearly wished to stay out of that particular fray. But, beside her, Tootles looked more than a touch troubled.

  “Wow, they’re really going at it,” he said, trying not to holler, but obviously feeling it was necessary in order to be heard over the wind and splattering rain. Lightning crashed somewhere nearby and Tootles jumped and then crouched lower behind his rocks. He’d always been terrified of storms. He didn’t think Tink knew that, of course, but she was a fairy. Not an idiot.

  He’d always made up excuses in order to stay behind when the Lost Boys went to play in the rain. And sometimes, when she felt like it, she even helped him along a little.

  Today, however, she didn’t feel like helping him at all.

  “Buck up, Tootles!” she hissed at him. “It’s just a little rain!”

  Thunder slammed into Skull Rock like a tangible force, shaking the rocks and crumbling walls around them.

  Long, long ago, in a time that none of them remembered, Skull Rock had been used by someone as a castle keep. However, for as long as there had been so much as fairies to flit about the island, the rock had been deserted, and its internal castle walls were as old and crumbling as its long-dead cause.

  Now those walls shook with brute force and pieces of the black rock broke off to crumble to the ground and water below.

  Tootles shot Tinkerbell a starkly dirty look and Tink had the decency to look slightly guilty. But then she covered it up, shrugged, and pointed to something beyond Peter and Wendy – something hiding behind the rocky outcroppings on the other side of the cavern below.

  “Who is that?” Tootles squinted and shielded his eyes from the rain, attempting to make out the two forms that were crouched and partially hidden in the shadows of the Skull’s mouth.

  “It’s Princess Tiger Lily and Great Big Little Panther,” Tinkerbell told him, matter-of-factly. “I think they’re here to help Peter, but they don’t recognize him.”