ALSO BY DAVE BARRY
FICTION
Tricky Business
Big Trouble
The Shepherd, the Angel, and Walter the Christmas Miracle Dog
NONFICTION
Dave Barry’s Money Secrets: Like: Why Is There a Giant Eyeball on the Dollar?
Boogers Are My Beat
Dave Barry Hits Below the Beltway: A Vicious and Unprovoked Attack on Our Most Cherished Political Institutions
Dave Barry Is Not Taking This Sitting Down
Dave Barry Turns 50
Dave Barry Is from Mars and Venus
Dave Barry’s Book of Bad Songs
Dave Barry in Cyberspace
Dave Barry’s Complete Guide to Guys
Dave Barry’s Gift Guide to End All Gift Guides
Dave Barry Is NOT Making This Up
Dave Barry Does Japan
Dave Barry’s Only Travel Guide You’ll Ever Need
Dave Barry Talks Back
Dave Barry Turns 40
Dave Barry Slept Here: A Sort of History of the United States
Dave Barry’s Greatest Hits
Homes and Other Black Holes
Dave Barry’s Guide to Marriage and/or Sex
Dave Barry’s Bad Habits: A 100% Fact-Free Book
Claw Your Way to the Top: How to Become the Head of a Major
Corporation in Roughly a Week
Stay Fit and Healthy Until You’re Dead
Babies and Other Hazards of Sex: How to Make a Tiny Person in Only 9
Months with Tools You Probably Have Around the Home
The Taming of the Screw
ALSO BY RIDLEY PEARSON
Kingdom Keepers—Disney After Dark
Kingdom Keepers II—Disney at Dawn
Kingdom Keepers III—Disney in Shadow
Steel Trapp—The Challenge
Killer Weekend
Cut and Run
The Body of David Hayes
The Diary of Ellen Rimbauer: My Life as Rose Red (writing as Joyce Reardon)
The Art of Deception
Parallel Lies
Middle of Nowhere
The First Victim
The Pied Piper
Beyond Recognition
Chain of Evidence
No Witnesses
The Angel Maker
Hard Fall
Probable Cause
Undercurrents
Hidden Charges
Blood of the Albatross
Never Look Back
WRITING AS WENDELL MCCALL
Dead Aim
Aim for the Heart
Concerto in Dead Flat
ALSO BY DAVE BARRY & RIDLEY PEARSON
Peter and the Starcatchers
Peter and the Sword of Mercy
Peter and the Secret of Rundoon
Escape from the Carnivale
Cave of the Dark Wind
This book is not authorized for sale by Publisher
in the countries of the European Union.
Copyright © 2006 Dave Barry and Page One, Inc.
Illustrations copyright © 2006 by Greg Call
All rights reserved. Published by Disney Editions, an imprint of Disney Book Group. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher.
For information address Disney Editions, 114 Fifth Avenue,
New York, New York 10011-5690.
Printed in the United States of America
Printing History
Disney Editions/Hyperion Books for Children hardcover edition / September 2006
Disney Editions/Hyperion Books for Children trade paperback / September 2007
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data on file.
ISBN: 978-1-4231-4107-5
Visit www.disneyhyperionbooks.com
Visit www.peterandtheshadowthieves.com
We dedicate this book to our children—Paige, Storey, Rob and Sophie—and to all the other children who read Peter and the Starcatchers, and asked us what happened next.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
We thank Wendy Lefkon, our unflagging champion, and her colleagues at Disney, for all their encouragement and support. (Not to mention the passes to Disney World.)
We thank Greg Call for his inspired illustrations, and his patience while we endlessly debated the question of what certain imaginary creatures look like.
We thank the many people who helped with research (Yes! There was some actual research!) and copyediting, especially Norman Anderson, Judi Smith, and David and Laurel Walters.
We thank the people who manage our lives despite all our efforts to thwart them: Louise Marsh, Nancy Litzinger, Joeylyn Lambert, and (again) Judi Smith.
We thank Jim Dale, who recorded the audio versions of both of our books, and who has a thousand voices, with a funny story for every one.
Most of all, we thank our wonderful wives, Michelle and Marcelle, who smile benignly when their husbands dress like pirates and talk like porpoises.
—Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson
TABLE OF CONTENTS
TITLE PAGE
COPYRIGHT PAGE
CHAPTER 1: A Speck on the Horizon
CHAPTER 2: The Choice
CHAPTER 3: The Wrong Side of the Mountain
CHAPTER 4: The Voice
CHAPTER 5: The Agreement
CHAPTER 6: The Darkest Way
CHAPTER 7: An Ally
CHAPTER 8: The Mission
CHAPTER 9: A Tasty Meal Lost
CHAPTER 10: Dead Eyes
CHAPTER 11: Strangers
CHAPTER 12: Something Familiar
CHAPTER 13: The Coming Danger
CHAPTER 14: The Farewell
CHAPTER 15: Into the Night
CHAPTER 16: One Look Back
CHAPTER 17:Ombra’s Feeling
CHAPTER 18: “No Bees at Sea”
CHAPTER 19: Anything Unusual
CHAPTER 20: The Signal
CHAPTER 21: The Scuttlebutt
CHAPTER 22: Tubby Ted’s Discovery
CHAPTER 23:A Second Visit
CHAPTER 24: The Stowaway
CHAPTER 25: Genius
CHAPTER 26: St. Katherine’s Dock
CHAPTER 27: Into the Storm
CHAPTER 28: Not Safe at All
CHAPTER 29: A Bone to Pick
CHAPTER 30: Somehow
CHAPTER 31: A Tiny Heart Beating
CHAPTER 32: A Feeling
CHAPTER 33: A Way Out
CHAPTER 34: A Visitor
CHAPTER 35: A Walk in the Dark
CHAPTER 36:A Few Seconds
CHAPTER 37: “I’ll Find You”
CHAPTER 38: The Shadow Thief
CHAPTER 39: The Market
CHAPTER 40: The Fear in Her Eyes
CHAPTER 41: Play It Safe
CHAPTER 42:The Standoff
CHAPTER 43: Thunder Down the Trail
CHAPTER 44: The Collector
CHAPTER 45: The Cold Iron Ring
CHAPTER 46: Hopeless
CHAPTER 47: The Drunken Centipede
CHAPTER 48: Something Strong
CHAPTER 49: Either Way
CHAPTER 50: Grasping Hands
CHAPTER 51: The Message from Egypt
CHAPTER 52: The Letter
CHAPTER 53: Potato Soup
CHAPTER 54: A Fine Name Indeed
CHAPTER 55: “Take All His Air”
CHAPTER 56: A Very Strange Business
CHAPTER 57:At Last
CHAPTER 58: Visitor
s
CHAPTER 59: Something Odd
CHAPTER 60: Overheard Words
CHAPTER 61: Footsteps
CHAPTER 62: Rough Hands
CHAPTER 63: The Thing on the Stairs
CHAPTER 64: The Black Pool
CHAPTER 65: An Urgent Search
CHAPTER 66: The Envelope
CHAPTER 67: The Phantom Light
CHAPTER 68: Conversation in a Tree
CHAPTER 69: A Cry on the Wind
CHAPTER 70:Reluctant Allies
CHAPTER 71: The Secret Place
CHAPTER 72: The Warder and the Watcher
CHAPTER 73: The Messenger
CHAPTER 74: The Ravens’ Cries
CHAPTER 75: Traitor’s Gate
CHAPTER 76: McGuinn
CHAPTER 77: Wolves on the Steps
CHAPTER 78: A Deadly Fall
CHAPTER 79: The Silent Struggle
CHAPTER 80: The Metal Man
CHAPTER 81: The Secret
CHAPTER 82: The Keep
CHAPTER 83: Ombra’s Plan
CHAPTER 84: A Voice in the Dark
CHAPTER 85: Dark Kites
CHAPTER 86: An Offer of Help
CHAPTER 87: The Golden Weather Vane
CHAPTER 88: A Good Friend of His
CHAPTER 89: No Choice
CHAPTER 90: George’s Thought
CHAPTER 91: The Destination
CHAPTER 92: Not Much Time
CHAPTER 93: A Raven’s Eye
CHAPTER 94: The Return
CHAPTER 95: A Swift, Sure Shadow
CHAPTER 96: Over Their Heads
CHAPTER 1
A SPECK ON THE HORIZON
A MANGO, THOUGHT PETER. The perfect weapon.
The scrawny, sunburned boy, dressed in a tattered shirt and pants torn off below scabby knees, brushed the unkempt reddish hair out of his face. It fell right back into his eyes as he bent to the sandy soil and scooped up the plump red-and-yellow fruit sphere, a bit bigger than an orange. The mango was squishy to the touch, too ripe for eating. But it was just the thing to drop on somebody’s head from a great height. And Peter knew precisely whose head he wanted to drop it on.
Holding the sweet-smelling mango in his left hand, Peter raised his right hand over his head and, pointing his index finger skyward, sprang up and rose swiftly from the earth. It was a dramatic takeoff, and totally unnecessary: Peter—an expert flyer now, after three months’ practice—could float easily upward in any position. But he enjoyed impressing the other boys.
“Peter!” shouted young James as he trotted toward the mango tree. He was followed by the rest of the Lost Boys, as they had come to call themselves—Prentiss, Thomas, and, lagging far behind, Tubby Ted.
“Where are you going?” asked James, his thin voice cracking.
“To pay the pirates a visit,” Peter announced. “I’ve a delivery to make.” He held out the oozing, overripe mango.
“Please, can’t I come?” begged James.
Peter was silent for a long moment. The only noise was the distant sound of surf pounding on the reef outside the lagoon. Then, reluctantly, Peter said, “’Fraid not, James. You can’t…I mean…You know.”
“Right,” said James. “I can’t fly.”
James said it matter-of-factly, but Peter saw the now-familiar look of disappointment in his eyes. He saw it also on the faces of Prentiss and Thomas, though all he saw on Tubby Ted’s face was mango pulp, as Tubby Ted had decided it was time for a snack. (For Tubby Ted, it was always time for a snack.)
Peter hovered for a moment, feeling a flicker of guilt. It seemed that more and more lately, he’d been having his best adventures alone. He almost decided to return to the earth and to carry out his attack by land, so his mates could join in the fun. Almost…
But walking took so long, and if they were on foot, the pirates might catch them. No, flying was the only way to do this.
“You’ll be safer here,” he said. “I’ll be back soon! We’ll have a game, or a snake hunt.”
“But,” said James, “I—”
“Sorry!” interrupted Peter, shooting skyward, not looking back. He soared above the treetops, his pangs of guilt changing to irritation tinged with self-pity.
It’s not my fault I can fly and they can’t, he thought. Besides, they’re safer back there. Can’t they see I’m looking out for them?
These thoughts were quickly driven from Peter’s mind by the sweeping view that greeted him as he shot into the radiant blue sky between two small, puffy, bright white clouds. He ascended at a steep angle, keeping his body parallel to the dark green mountain ridge that rose sharply to form the backbone of the island.
As he cleared the summit, he could see the whole of Mollusk Island. Far below, on the side he’d come from, was the shimmering blue-green expanse of calm, protected water that the boys called Mermaid Lagoon. Peter could see the tiny figures of a half dozen mermaids sunning themselves on the broad, flat rock they favored. One of the figures waved—probably their leader, the one known as Teacher. She was quite fond of Peter, a fact that both embarrassed and pleased him.
Peter returned the wave, then continued his aerial survey of the island. Curved around the blue-green waters of the lagoon was the island’s widest beach, a semicircle of soft, sugar-white sand, fringed with coconut trees. Behind the beach, in a small clearing nestled at the base of the mountain slope, was the boys’ home—a dome-shaped driftwood hut, covered with palm thatch, that they’d erected with the help of the Mollusk tribe. A quarter mile from their hut, in a bigger clearing surrounding a massive tree, was the Mollusk village itself, where gray smoke was drifting skyward from several cooking fires.
The Mollusks—whose chief, Fighting Prawn, owed Peter his life—had proved to be generous hosts. They’d shown the boys how to spear fish, which fish to spear, how to clean and cook them, where to get fresh water, how to keep a fire going, what to do when a hairy jumping spider the size of a squirrel leaped on your head—all the basic skills of island survival.
Peter suspected that Fighting Prawn also had men posted in the jungle to keep an eye on the boys’ hut, lest the pirates decided to pay a visit. This had been reassuring at first, but as the weeks and months passed, Peter had become more and more certain that the pirates didn’t dare venture to this side of the island, where they would be greatly outnumbered by the Mollusks. His fear had turned to confidence, then to cockiness. In recent days he’d taken to amusing himself by flying across the island to the pirate encampment and taunting the pirate who had once terrified him and the entire seafaring world—Black Stache.
But Peter had given him a new name.
Peter looked down the other side of the mountain, toward what the boys called Pirate Cove. On a bluff overlooking the cove was the pirates’ fort, a squat structure made of logs that had been laboriously hacked down with swords and bound with thick jungle vines.
Reaching the apex of his ascent, Peter eased to a stop and hovered for a moment. He was about to begin his descent when he heard a sound behind him. To a normal person it would have sounded like bells—tiny, perfectly pitched, melodious bells. Peter could hear the bells, but he also heard words inside his head, and they were not happy words. He sighed and turned slowly to face a most displeased Tinker Bell, her silvery wings buzzing furiously, her tiny face red and pinched with anger.
“I did not run off,” he said, though he knew he had. “It’s not my fault if you don’t keep up.”
More bells. Peter cut them off mid-tinkle.
“Listen, Tink,” Peter said. “You’re not my mother or father. I have no mother or father. I don’t have to answer to you. I don’t have to answer to anybody.”
The sound of more bells: musical and quieter now.
“Yes, I do know that,” Peter said, also softening. “I understand perfectly well that Lord Aster left you to look out for me, and I appreciate it. But that was when I was new to…to all this.” He gestured at his airborne body, then the island below. “It’s
different now. I’ve learned a lot. I can take care of myself. I don’t need a fairy watching—”
He was interrupted by an angry outburst of shrill bells. Tinker Bell disliked the name “fairy,” which she saw as a slight to her heritage.
“Sorry,” said Peter. “I mean, I don’t need a birdgirl watching over me.”
More bells. Instructive.
“What dangers?” said Peter. “There’s nothing on this island for me to worry about except old Captain Hook down there, and he’s too scared to come near our side of the island with the Mollusks about. Even if he does come, how’s he going to catch me if he can’t fly? Face it, Tink, nothing here can hurt me. Nothing.”
More bells.
“Well, that’s your opinion,” said Peter. “But I don’t agree, and I don’t plan to stay up here all day arguing with a…a birdgirl.”
He turned his back on her and angled his body to start his downward swoop. Tinker Bell flew in front of him, still tinkling.
“Fine,” Peter said, impatient now. “I can’t stop you from coming. Just don’t get in the way, okay?”
With that, he gripped the mango, let out a whoop, and began his dive toward the pirate fort, his mind focusing now on his plan of attack. He was so intent on landing the mango on his target that he failed to notice two things: one was a small human form below, making its way laboriously up to the summit of the mountain. Had Peter looked closely, he would have seen that the form was James, who was determined that, this time, he would not miss out on the adventure.
The other thing Peter missed was a speck on the horizon—a tiny dark shape, far out to sea.
A speck that was, ever so slowly, growing larger.
CHAPTER 2
THE CHOICE
THE AIR SUDDENLY TASTED OF LAND.
Captain Nerezza turned his pox-eaten face windward, where two small, puffy clouds hugged the horizon, reminding him of the mashed potatoes in a shepherd’s pie.
Everything reminded Nerezza of food these days: he and his crew had dined on hardtack and skinned rats for the past two weeks, having run low on food and, far worse, water, as they wandered the sea aimlessly, increasingly desperate. Nerezza had begun to wonder if there really was an island, or just a madman’s confused memories.
But now these midmorning clouds hovered, stationary, all alone, not another spot of white in the rich, cobalt-blue sky. And that tantalizing taste lay ever so gently on his salty, parched tongue.
Peter and the Shadow Thieves Page 1