18. Wendy
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
WENDY
Once Malachi is gone, Roc and Vane lead us to their loft with no discussion about the latest turn of events. Just a few blocks to the north of the warehouse, it doesn’t take us long to reach it. The stairway is tucked to the right of a tavern entrance, with a hat shop on the other side. Coincidence or not? I’m beginning to wonder about the hat connections to Roc and Vane’s family.
First, a magical hat that can remove Mareth’s soul, then a collection of hats so dangerous, we’re warned not to touch them?
I noticed Asha’s interest at the mention of the Variant Collection. She always knows more than most.
Roc flips a light switch and one by one, hanging globes ignite with gas, then light.
I look around.
This is the first real thing of Roc’s I’ve been immersed in. Being with him or around him, everything I encountered was limited or controlled.
There is nowhere to hide here, but glancing at him, he doesn’t seem to be affected by it. There is no air of vulnerability to him.
The loft is mostly one big, connected space, with a kitchen on the right of the entrance and a living space to the left with a table at the far end of the room set beneath a bank of cloudy windows twice as high as Roc is tall. Any daylight allowed to spill through the windows has a green cast to it. Most of the Umbrage is like this, dark and gritty and sallow. Roc seems right at home here.
He goes to the kitchen and pulls out several glasses with one hand, setting them on the long island that separates the kitchen from the living space. As he pours a round of drinks, I wander the perimeter of the room.
There are two additional doors branching off from the main loft. Peeking into the first one, I find a bathroom with black stone floors and a copper clawfoot tub. The second door leads to a large bedroom. There’s a king-sized bed with a headboard made of black metal spindles. The bedding—black and silky—is pulled taut as if the bed were made and measured at the end of a ruler.
I keep wandering. Books are stacked up on a few end tables, some on the stone window ledges. Classic monster stories, mythologies, history of the Isles, and the mortal realm.
There’s a thick stone ashtray on a coffee table with just a dusting of ash inside.
Roc offers everyone a drink, and when he comes to me, he holds the glass back, a questioning glint in his eyes. “Are you seeing anything of interest, Your Majesty?”
I let my attention wander away from him. There’s an oil painting on the wall beside the bedroom door. There’s a queen in the distance, standing on a moor, but she’s pale, grotesque, and it looks like she’s screaming. The sky is stormy and bruised. In the foreground, a dark shadow with pale green eyes.
“Who are you? Really?”
He finally gives me the glass. He takes a sip from his. He doesn’t take his eyes off me, but I can’t tell if he’s looking out or inviting me in, all the way to the dark center of who he is.
“Who am I?” He smirks at me. “Who are you, Wendy Darling?”
There is a challenge in his words. Not to define either of us. But to reject the notion that we must be defined.
It reminds me of a poem Asha read me once, the original text smuggled into the Seven Isles from the mortal realms.
Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.)
Roc is many things: man and monster and dark, tempting myth. Perhaps in my desire to know him for who he really is, I fooled myself into believing he could be known. Can any of us be known? Truly for who we are?
I glance over the rise of Roc’s shoulder at James. He’s staring at us both, watching, waiting. If Roc is the gale force always propelling us forward, then James is the life raft, making sure we don’t drown.
I need both of these men in different ways, but I don’t think I can truly be with anyone until I figure out who I am, multitudes in all.
All of the years I fought to survive in the Everland court, I kept telling myself that once I escaped it, I would finally be allowed to live the life I wanted. Mine was stolen from me so early on, first by Peter Pan, then by King Hald.
Maybe somewhere along the way, I started to believe my life was never going to be my own. And that belief has swallowed me up slowly, year after year, like a dark stain.
“This is a trap, you know,” Vane says.
I blink, look away from James and back to Roc.
“Drink your drink, Your Majesty,” he tells me and then pulls away, breaking the tension between us.
I almost stumble forward as if his attention was a crutch I needed to keep myself upright.
I bring the glass to my lips and pull in a sip. The liquor is a welcomed bite.
“Of course it’s a trap.” Roc goes around to the kitchen and leans his backside against the counter. He lights a cigarette and the smoke curls up into the high ceiling, spinning around the hanging globe lights. “The question is, who is setting it? Malachi crossing us is too obvious and he would know that. I think he wants what he says he wants. The question is, is he being discreet about it all?”
“What’s your witch saying?” Asha asks. She’s pulled herself up on the island, her legs dangling over the edge.
Roc sets his glass aside. “She is against working with him.”
“That could also be a trap,” Vane says.
Roc snorts. “Is everything a trap to you?”
“Yes,” Winnie answers with a laugh. “He is suspicious of everyone.”
“That’s because everyone is suspicious.”
Asha hops off the island. “Do you think it’s a coincidence that they’ve seized your manor house?”
This is the elephant in the room, surely. I’ve been thinking about it ever since Malachi mentioned it.
“A coincidence?” Roc asks. “No. It was a targeted decision. There are at least a hundred mansions and manors on Darkland. It didn’t have to be that one.”
“What is their reason for wanting that one, then?” Asha asks, but I know her well. She’s not asking because she needs an answer, she’s asking because she already knows and she needs it confirmed.
“Here’s the plan.” Vane breaks away from Winnie and comes to the center of the room. It’s hard not to be instantly drawn to him. Much like Roc, there’s something magnetic about Vane. I used to think it was their good looks, which yes, is likely some of it. But now I wonder if it’s also their power, the monster that lurks beneath. It must give them a certain kind of presence that is impossible to ignore.
“You are staying here.” Vane points at Roc. “And both of you should stay with him.” He nods at me and James next. “Both of you are a weakness for him and whatever is going on here, he is the center.”
I don’t want to admit it, but hearing Vane acknowledge my importance to Roc makes my stomach ignite with butterflies. No one knows Roc better than Vane. And yes, Roc did reassure me on the ship, but there’s something about a third-party confirmation that just makes it more real.
“Asha and I will go to the manor.”
“And me?” Winnie crosses her arms over her chest anticipating a fight.
“You’ll stay here.”
She tilts her head and gives him a look, popping out a hip while she does.
“Win,” he says, almost a growl.
“The shadow is more powerful when it’s together. Exiling me here only inhibits it.”
“She has a point,” Roc says.
“Shut up. You don’t know anything about the shadow.”
“I mean, half plus half equals one. I do know how to count.”
“Fine.” Vane spreads out his arms, a show of deference. At this point, I don’t know why he tries to fight her. She clearly, always, wins.
“You, Asha and I will go to the manor,” he goes on. “I will kill the Myth to fulfill our obligation to Malachi and as soon as he’s given us the hat, I will kill him too.”
“Now, there’s no need to get passive-aggressive about it.” Roc bends down to scoop up Firecracker and cradles the cat in his arms. “Malachi is doing what you or I would have done if we needed to keep our hands clean.”
“I don’t care. I’m still killing him.”
Firecracker digs his claws into Roc’s shirt and climbs up on his shoulder. “I feel it’s my duty to point out that by killing Malachi, we surrender a potential ally in this fight against the Myths. Mareth, her sister, Amanon, I can guarantee they aren’t the only ones on Lostland plotting the occupation of the Seven Isles.”
Vane crosses his arms over his chest. “He broke into the warehouse.”
“Yes, and he could have taken anything. He took a hat.”
“This time. What will he take the next?”
“Don’t kill him,” Roc finally says, and there is a finality in his voice.
Vane grumbles but doesn’t further the argument.
“Now that that’s settled, let’s talk about attire.” Roc reaches up to scratch Firecracker beneath the chin and the cat leans into the attention. “My closet may have a suit for you, but I’m short a few ball gowns for the ladies.”
“Is Lia’s shop still around?” Vane asks.
“Yes. Same building. Different owner.”
“I’ll take them.” He starts for the door.
“Can I come?”
Vane stops, hand on the door handle. He looks back at me, considering the request before checking his brother for permission. Roc shrugs. “I don’t own her.”
“I wouldn’t mind spending more time with Winnie while we have it,” I say.
I may have been queen of an entire kingdom, but I still had to ask for permission for literally anything I wanted to do. The habit is still trailing me like a ghost.
Winnie comes over, threading her arm around my shoulders. “I’d love that.”
I warm beneath her touch. The way she so easily shows affection is something I admire and yet don’t understand. Touching was prohibited in court. It was seen as obscene, unseemly. Touching only happened behind closed doors, preferably in the dark. Being touched, needing to feel skin-to-skin contact, it wasn’t something any of us were encouraged to admit.
“We’ll make a date of it.” Winnie smiles over at me.
“We’ll all go then.” Roc snaps his fingers at James. “You’re coming too.”
“I don’t want to go dress shopping.”
“Too bad.”
James grumbles but follows the order. On his ship, he may be used to being in charge, but when it comes to Roc, he and I have both met our match.
The front of Lia’s shop reminds me of striped candies. The columns are painted bright green while the facade is painted soft, salmon pink. The delicate hand-carved cornices are gilded in gold.
The recessed entrance is flanked by two bay windows where several wooden mannequins display a collection of fine dresses, some ballgowns, others day dresses.
Roc pushes the door in, jangling the copper bell that hangs above. He holds the door for our entire party to shuffle in.
Soft light flickers in hanging globe pendants, not too dissimilar to the lighting in Roc’s loft.
Over the years, on Everland, I had a general feeling that we were behind in advancements. People visited our courts from other islands and while they would never come right out and say it, I got the sense they were missing luxuries from their homelands.
Most of our lighting was candle or kerosene. It wasn’t until the last handful of years that some of the merchants along the waterline had started pushing the privy council to install modern lighting. Of course, the council liked to keep us in the dark ages, literally. The merchants hadn’t managed to gain much progress.
The lighting that I’ve seen here on Darkland seems to be some kind of gas. The globes dance with light, like flame trapped in a bottle. It’s mesmerizing.
“Do my eyes deceive me?” a voice calls from the back of the shop. “Has the Crocodile decided to grace my shop once again?”
“Oh, don’t badger me, Antony,” Roc says. “I’m here now.”
A man, half as tall as Roc, comes flitting out of the dress racks. He’s wearing a black suit with a bow tie the same salmon pink as the storefront. His hair is bleached nearly white, his beard too, so that it stands out starkly against his dark skin.
Several green stones wink from silver settings in his ears.
“Badgering you is my favorite hobby.” Antony comes to a stop at Roc’s side. “You’ve…” He narrows his eyes and looks him up and down. “Changed? What’s different about you?”
“A great many things,” is what Roc says.
“I’ll say.” Antony reaches out, hooking his arm through Roc’s, cozying up to him.
James takes a step, pushing his hook between Roc and Antony.
Both men glance at James and I see the sudden surprise dawn on James’s face.
“I… he …” James crumbles. “Please get your hands off him.”
Antony cocks his head back. “Oh. Okay. Okay.” He looks up at Roc. “Someone’s finally managed to snag you?”
“When a handsome pirate claims me, who am I to resist?”
Antony chuckles. It’s the kind of deep, rich laughter that makes everything feel lighter and airier.
“It’s not like that,” James says.
Antony squeezes James’s hand as he moves away. “It doesn’t have to be anything, friend. Just let it be what it is.”
Roc swings his arm around James and pulls him down the aisle, following in Antony’s footsteps. “Yes, Captain. Just let us be what we are.”
I sense the air shifting beside me. “You know you can claim him too?” Winnie whispers.
Asha and Vane disappear into the clothing racks, pretending to look at the clothing while secretly plotting the strategy. They’ve only met, but Asha seems right at home with Roc and Vane. As if they understand one another.
We wander down an aisle, then around a rack of simple cotton dresses. Roc and James come into view again. Roc is so tall that he’s easy to spot across the racks of clothing.
There is agency in claiming something, in deciding it belongs to you. But nothing has ever belonged to me. Peter Pan kidnapped me when I was eighteen and I never returned home. Not even my own baby, my own flesh and blood, belonged to me. She was taken from my arms, smuggled a world away.
Everything I’ve ever had, has been stolen from me.
Everything I had in the Everland Court, I knew, deep down, belonged to Hald and that he could rip it away again at any moment.
“I’m afraid.” The words slip out of me without thinking about what they might cost.
Winnie tilts her head, regarding me like a puzzle piece, defining my edges as if to decide where I might fit best.
“Why?” she asks.
“They abandoned me once. They can again.” My vision goes watery with tears. “And now they have this entire thing without me. I don’t want to ruin their equilibrium.”
Winnie snorts. “Have you ever thought to ask yourself if you are the equilibrium?”
I frown. “What do you mean?”
“If there is anything I’ve learned about being with Vane and Pan, Bash and Kas?—”
“Wait, you’re with all four of them?” My question comes out almost a wheeze of incredulity.
“Yes? You didn’t know?”
“I think I thought it was Vane and Pan, mostly. The twins…I guess I wasn’t sure.”
“The twins aren’t as obvious about it as Vane and Pan. Kas and Bash aren’t as possessive or territorial. But yes, I’m with all four of them. We’ve negotiated all of the pitfalls of a five-person relationship. And trust me, there are a lot. But what I was saying is, while I might have come to them very late in their relationships, and I could have easily felt like a fifth wheel, I quickly learned they needed me just as much as I needed them. Hook and Roc might have established something before finding you—which honestly, the fact I’m even saying that is wild, trust me, they were trying to kill each other not that long ago. But anyway, what I mean is, you are not a third wheel. They need you for who you are, just like you need them for who they are. You just have to figure out what that is and embrace it.”
We pass a rack of hairbands that are sequined and embroidered and feathered. “You are my great-great-great something granddaughter, and somehow, I feel like you are far wiser than I ever was.”
She chuckles and takes my hand affectionately. “There’s this saying in my world—our world—fake it till you make it. I’m mostly just faking it.”
We laugh together.
“What is our world like now? What is something you think might surprise me?”
“Hmmm, oh god. Let me think. There’s so much.” We keep walking the perimeter of the store. “Oh here’s a good one. Women can finally own property.”
I pull away. “Truly?”
She nods. “And bank accounts.”
We make it to the back of the shop. Vane and Asha have decided on a green dress for Winnie, and while I took Winnie for a person who likes to be in charge of her own destiny, she gives no resistance, proving that perhaps she is the most measured woman I’ve ever met.
I like her more and more every minute.
Asha decides on a billowy black dress—“To hide my weapons”—and Vane picks out a tux.
While they finalize the sales, I admire a gorgeous red dress on a mannequin nestled in an arched alcove. The bodice is formfitting with hundreds of sequins sewn into it. The skirt is layers and layers of tulle, but there’s a slit just off center to show off the wearer’s thigh.
“This one too,” I hear Roc say behind me.
“That’s an excellent selection.” Antony sidles up near me. “With your complexion, and dark hair, it’ll look fabulous on you.”
“Oh. No. I mean, I don’t have any money and this must cost a fortune.” I meet Roc’s gaze. He’s not looking at the dress, but directly at me, when he says, “Take it off the floor, Antony. Charge it to my tab.”
Antony winks at me. “Right away.”
A few workers appear from the back and all of our purchases are folded and backed into tissue, then into boxes.
“You didn’t have to do that,” I say to Roc. “I have no occasion to wear it. It’s a waste of your money.”
“Oh I didn’t buy it for you,” he answers.
“I’m confused.”
“It was mostly self-serving. I wanted the opportunity to rip it from your body sometime in the near future.” He winks at me.
A blush burns through my cheeks.
“And that, Your Majesty, is exactly why I bought that dress. Impropriety makes you flush and I find it fucking hot. I will have you begging for depravity before long.”
Antony calls him away, leaving me blinking at the now naked mannequin, face burning, liquid heat pooling between my legs.