Lost Boy

by Christina Henry

  None of this stopped him from putting up his fists in clear invitation.

  I hadn’t wanted to fight him earlier, so I’d sent Nip off with Nod and Fog. Now I wanted to fight. It’d been boiling in me all day.

  First the dream, and Peter’s insistence on a raid that would probably kill half the boys, then Nip’s bullying of Del and that thrice-bedamned story about the duckling that Peter told to terrify Charlie half to death. I’d been holding back so as not to scare the little boy who trailed behind me, but now Nip offered a chance to beat him good and bloody and I was going to take it.

  It wasn’t fair of me, not really. Nip was about the same height as me, and he had more weight on him, but he was still staggering-stupid from before. It wasn’t an even fight.

  I didn’t care if it was even or not. I just wanted to beat the piss out of somebody.

  So Nip put his fists up and I smiled at him. And when I smiled he dropped his fists a little and asked, “What are you smiling about?”

  His nose was broken before he realized why I was smiling.

  Then his cheekbone—I heard it crack—then I kicked in his stomach and he staggered back, puking his guts up.

  I would have done more. I could have done more. The red haze was riding hard in my blood and I wanted to peel his eyelids back and pop his eyeballs out. I wanted to put Nip down for good.

  But then I heard Charlie’s tiny gasp as the bigger boy retched out what little he’d eaten that day. When I looked back I saw his eyes as giant pools of blue in a face as white as a seabird’s wing feather.

  There was blood on my knuckles from where I’d busted Nip’s nose open, but I knelt and opened my arms to Charlie and he ran into them. I felt that hard anger receding—not disappearing, for it never disappeared entirely but waited for the right feeding to bring it back to life.

  Nip retched again, his breath harsh and shallow. He started to speak but I stopped him.

  “You leave off the other boys, you hear?” I said. “Else there’ll be more of the same for you.”

  Nip’s eyes narrowed at me, full of resentment. “What’s it to you? Who do you think you are, anyway? Peter picked me himself.”

  “Don’t go thinking that makes you special,” I said. They were all the same. They all thought they were special, but only I was. I was first and none of them could take that from me. I was first and best and last and always. Peter could do without them but not without me. Never without me. “You’re here to be part of our band, and we all work together here.”

  “I’m not taking orders from you,” Nip said.

  “Then you can leave,” I said. “Go live with the pirates and see how you like that.”

  “Try and make me,” Nip said, and sneered. His face was spattered with blood from his nose, and his left cheekbone moved in a very wrong way when he talked. He must have been full of vinegar to keep gabbing at me through that. “Don’t see how you can when you’re playing nanny.”

  Charlie was nothing to do with this, and I wasn’t going to let this new boy bring him in.

  “I can kill you with one hand,” I said, and let Nip see it in my eyes.

  “Can you really?” Charlie whispered in my ear.

  I nodded once, and wondered if Charlie would be scared of me now. But instead he gripped my neck tighter, like he knew for certain I was strong enough to look after him, to keep him safe. And I was.

  Nip watched me, his mean little eyes going from my face to the back of Charlie’s head resting on my shoulder. I saw him working something out that I didn’t care for.

  All this happened while Peter watched and waited by the dying embers of the fire. The sun’s slanting rays were longer and longer by the minute. I wasn’t keen on starting off after the others in the dark.

  “Leave off the other boys, and do as you’re told,” I said to Nip. “Or else you’ll pay for it.”

  I turned away then, for he was the sort of boy who would learn his lesson only after hard knocks, so there wasn’t any point in standing there bandying words with him all day.

  “Now can we go a-raiding?” Peter asked in a singsong voice, skipping around me like a child asking his father for a sweet. “If we don’t catch up to the rest soon they’ll get eaten by the Many-Eyed without you there.”

  “Nod and Fog can look out for them,” I said mildly, though I privately agreed. Nod and Fog could take orders, but too often they got caught up in their own concerns to take proper care of the other boys. “Besides, they’ll stop at the cave for the night before they get to the fields.”

  “Then let’s go!” Peter cried, and ran into the woods after the others.

  Nip had pushed up to his feet. He looked a right mess and none too steady. I hoped he fell off a cliff or wandered into the mouth of a bear on the way and saved me some future trouble, for he was staring at me with that trouble in his eyes.

  “Are you coming or not?” I shouted to him.

  He didn’t say a word to me, only went after Peter.

  Charlie had picked up his head to watch the bigger boy. “Maybe he’ll get lost,” he whispered hopefully.

  “Maybe he will,” I said, and rumpled his hair. “You don’t like Nip, do you?”

  “He tried to take Del’s food,” Charlie said as I placed him on the ground. He immediately grabbed the hem of my coat as we went toward the path after the others. “He would have eaten mine if you weren’t there.”

  He understood this instinctively, understood that because he was small there would always be those who tried to use their size against him.

  Nip and Peter weren’t far ahead of us on the trail and I didn’t fancy the four of us walking together like a happy family. “Do you want me to show you something, Charlie?”

  “What?” he asked.

  “A shortcut,” I said.

  “A shortcut to what?”

  “I know where they’ll stop for the night,” I said. “And anyway, all those boys don’t know how to be quiet when they’re together. We’ll hear them before we see them.”

  “And we won’t have to walk with Nip,” Charlie said, his eyes lit up at the thought of a shortcut, a secret for only him and me.

  That was the magic the island had—rocks to scramble over and trees to climb and mermaid lagoons to swim in and, yes, pirates to fight. I didn’t want to take the boys there today, but fighting pirates was some of the best fun you could have. The whole island was a great wide playground for boys like us to run in, to make secret places, to go where we wished and when we wanted with no adults to stop us or make us mind.

  And Charlie, he needed that magic. I was pretty certain that we’d taken this little duckling from a mama who loved him.

  Peter didn’t think very much of mothers—it had been far too long since he’d had one to remember, and most of the boys had the kind of mothers you wanted to forget.

  Peter said mine was like that too, that she’d harangued and beaten me, but I didn’t remember her. I didn’t remember too much from before, only flashes, and sometimes the songs that made my heart ache and Peter frown.

  I knew the boys would stop at Bear Cave for the night, so named because the first time Peter and I went there we found the bones of a huge bear. Peter had loved that snarling skull so much that he mounted it on the wall and we dug a fire pit beneath it like some altar to an ancient god. When the fire was lit the flames played strangely on the skull, making it seem that at any moment it would live again, devouring us all.

  I spared a thought for how those dancing shadows would frighten Charlie, then let it pass. I couldn’t keep things from scaring him, only from harming him.

  The boys would stop at the Bear Cave, because there was good cover there and it was well before the fields of the Many-Eyed.

  Nod and Fog, for all that they both seemed fearless, were both terrified of the Many-Eyed. I’d never shame them for t
his; nor would anyone on the island with sense. Even Peter, who liked to tease and play on the others’ fears, wouldn’t mock this.

  The boys wouldn’t try to cross the fields without Peter or me, and it was pure foolishness to try at night in any case. That was asking to get eaten.

  Charlie followed me off the path and into the dark thicket of trees. It was cooler away from the main walk where the sun beat down on the exposed trail. Here under the canopy of leaves the small flies didn’t buzz and bite, and the shifting shadows welcomed those with a heart to explore.

  Little soft things scurried in the undergrowth, rabbits and field mice and miniature foxes with overlarge ears and watchful eyes. I liked the soft loam of the earth here, the wet green smell of the ferns mixed with the pungent sweetness of fallen fruit.

  The trees arced over our heads far above, the long broad leaves tangling there like they stood arm in arm, protecting us.

  “I like it here,” Charlie said, kneeling to push his fingers into the dirt. He laughed when several fat pink earthworms poked their heads blindly through the surface, waving about like they were sniffing for an intruder.

  All we needed to do was cut through the forest and we would come out alongside the rocky cliff that led up to Bear Cave. The footing was narrow there, but Charlie was small and I’d climbed it so many times I could do it in my sleep.

  We’d easily beat Peter and Nip there if they stayed to the path, for the path they followed twisted and rambled all through the forest and countryside before stopping at the point of Bear Cave, where the mountains met the plains.

  And Nip wasn’t all together in his mind and body either. The memory of his broken cheekbone moving out of time with the rest of his jaw made me smile to myself.

  Charlie ran ahead of me, giggling and flushing birds out of their nests in the ferns so that they chirped angrily at him. It was the first time I’d seen him free and happy since he’d arrived on the island.

  When night fell and the woods grew dark, he came back to me. It didn’t feel that this was because he was scared, just a little unsure where to walk.

  Bigger animals moved in the dark around us. We heard the soft pad of hooves and spotted the gleam of white antlers.

  Later, we heard a bear snuffling toward us, big and broad and smelling of the last thing he killed. Bears mostly left us boys alone, but the reek of this one warned me of its approach and I decided not to risk it, pushing Charlie onto a tree branch and following after him.

  We waited until the bear’s shadow passed underneath the branches we perched on and its grunting bulk gradually moved away.

  “Would it eat us?” Charlie asked. I was glad to hear that he didn’t sound frightened, only curious.

  “Probably not,” I said. “Bears have much better things to eat on this island than skinny boys, and that one has already had a feast.”

  “I smelled the blood,” Charlie said. “It probably had some rabbits, like us.”

  “A rabbit’s nothing but a mouthful to a big old grunter like that.” I laughed. “He’s been at deer or elk or maybe some of the fat silverfish that live in the ponds and streams. All those kind are much better food for a bear than us, but a bear is something that kills, and being something that kills, the best wisdom is to avoid its teeth and claws.”

  “Are you something that kills?” Charlie asked. “Nod and Fog say that you are. They say no one’s killed more pirates than you.”

  “I’ve lived here a long time,” I said. “Peter’s lived here even longer.”

  I shifted uneasily as his bright little eyes studied me in the moonlight. Both of us knew quite well that I hadn’t answered the question.

  I’d killed more pirates than I could remember, and for longer than I could remember. The pirates hated Peter but they hated me more, for I was a plague to them, a plague that cut away their best and youngest mates. No older pirate was quick enough to face me, so they sent their bright things to try to take me. But no bright young man, for all that he has the strength of a man, was as fast as a twelve-year-old boy. And I had experience on my side, though I did not look it.

  You’d think that after all these years of losses to us, the pirates would choose another island when they wanted to stay in port, but they returned to ours season after season. One time, long ago, I asked Peter why they kept coming back.

  “Because they want to know why we never grow up, silly,” Peter said, and cuffed the back of my head. “They think we have some special treasure that keeps us young, and they want it.”

  I frowned at him. “If they want it, then why don’t they ever go past the beach near their ship?”

  “They think they’ll catch one of us when we come a-raiding,” Peter said.

  I snorted a laugh, and Peter smiled at me, and when he smiled like that it was just the two of us together, brothers forever.

  Charlie’s voice brought me back to the woods and the dark, his voice and the fear in it. “Will I have to kill a pirate?”

  “Not if you don’t want to,” I said. Not if I have anything to say about it, you won’t.

  “I don’t know how to fight,” Charlie said.

  “You’re not the only one,” I said, thinking of the other new boys, the ones who’d never handled a sword or a knife. “Just stay with me and you’ll be fine.”

  I hopped off the branch and reached up for him, and as I set him on the ground I decided. Peter wouldn’t like it, but I wasn’t going to let Charlie anywhere near the pirate camp. I was going to tuck him up in a tree or a cave like a baby in a cradle and keep him well away from any fighting. If I was lucky, Peter wouldn’t notice.

  Except Peter notices everything.

  There was always a first time, I reasoned. He might be so busy with the raid that he wouldn’t trouble to keep track of Charlie, though since the little boy was almost always attached to my sleeve that was unlikely.

  Charlie’s silence told me he was worried about the pirates, and the joy had gone out of the adventure in the woods.

  Too damned little, I thought for the dozenth time that day. Too little for all of this.

  We emerged from the forest right at the bottom of the cliff path. The boys up in the cave had a fire lit and the smell of burning wood and meat had led us to them for a good mile before we reached the cliff. They were having a raucous time of it, too—screeching and laughing and jumping about.

  “They’re having a jolly time,” I said, smiling down at Charlie.

  He stared up the path at the leaping shadows and beyond, into the cold white eye of the moon. He didn’t seem to think it was very jolly up there, and his fist wound into my coat again.

  I detached him gently. “You have to go ahead of me. There’s not room for us side by side.”

  He stubbornly rewound his fist and shook his head. “I don’t want to.”

  I felt the first stirrings of impatience. “You have to.”

  “I don’t want to,” Charlie repeated.

  I deliberately peeled his hand out of my coat and pushed him toward the path. “You have to. We can’t stand here playing about all night.”

  He wriggled away from my hands, shaking his head, his mouth set in an obstinate line. “No.”

  I didn’t know whether this was about Peter or Nip or that he was afraid of the dark or the cliff path or what. I just knew that I wasn’t of a mind to deal with his nonsense. I didn’t care about Charlie’s reasons at that moment; I just wanted him to mind me.

  I was angry and let him see it. “You have to go up there. If you don’t, I’ll leave you here.”

  His face went shocked and white. I could have smacked him and hurt him less, I reckon. “The duckling,” he whispered. “What about the duckling?”

  “The bloody duckling didn’t listen, didn’t mind,” I said, starting up the cliff path and leaving Charlie there, staring after me.

 
Peter was right. I didn’t do them any good when I tried to take care of them. I wasn’t Charlie’s mama and it wasn’t down to me to be one. If that stupid little boy fell in the crocodile pond or got eaten by a bear or wandered into the fields of the Many-Eyed, it was no nevermind to me because he wasn’t my problem, not my responsibility.

  Peter was the one who’d wanted the little brat. Let him look after Charlie, let him . . .

  My steps slowed, then stopped. I was about halfway up the path, the raucous shouts of the boys in the cave practically inside my ear, they were so loud. I looked back.

  Charlie stood at the base of the path, his face upturned in the moonlight, tears streaming from his eyes.

  He appeared frozen, his muscles locked, unable to follow, unable to do anything but wait. Wait for me to return for him.

  I sighed, and my anger went out with that sigh. Peter chose the boys, yes, he did. But he didn’t care for them. He didn’t look after them. He didn’t teach them how to find the best mushrooms or how to string a line to catch a fish. He took them to fight the pirates but didn’t teach them how to do it properly so they wouldn’t get killed. He didn’t show them how to skin a deer for clothes or comfort them when they cried in the night or bury them when they died. I did that.

  Peter was good for showing you the quickest path to the mermaid lagoon and for picking teams in Battle and for sneaking through the pirate camp at night, stealing shiny things that he stored in a hollow in our tree like he was an overgrown magpie. Peter was for fun, for play, for adventures. Me, I kept his playmates alive—even when he didn’t want them anymore. Like Charlie.

  I went back down the path, sure-footed despite the narrow track and the crumbling edge that promised a hard bruising fall, if not a broken bone.

  I wasn’t sure Charlie would forgive me, but as I approached he broke into a run and leapt at me. I stumbled a little until I had his weight, saying, “Hey, now, you’ll make us both fall,” but not in a gruff way.

  Charlie’s wet face pressed against my neck and he said over and over, “I’m sorry, Jamie, I’m sorry. I’ll listen. I’ll be good. I’m sorry, only don’t leave me.”