Chapter 19
I awoke to two pairs of large brown eyes staring curiously at me.
Instinctively, I grasped the blanket and clutched it upwards, making sure it covered me. A line of light shone through the crack under the door, signaling that it was morning.
A little girl of about five squatted in front of me, next to her younger brother. “Is he your husband?” she asked, taking in James and his brace flowing across his shoulders and the hook on his hand that was resting on my left hip.
“Umm.” I wasn’t sure why I was hesitant. I’d said he was my husband easily enough the night before. Only now that I thought about it, James once had a wife, and I felt odd claiming that title—like I was stealing something special from him.
James’s arm under the blanket tightened around me. “Of course she’s my wife. You don’t think I’d let someone this wonderful get away from me, do you?”
My cheeks blazed.
The children looked startled that it was he who had responded, instead of me.
James raised his hook so they saw it better. “I bet you’d both like to hear the story of how I got this, wouldn’t you?”
The young ones nodded, wide-eyed.
“I was in a battle with this evil tyrant. I about had him, when, at the last second, he lopped off my hand and threw it to a Crocodile.”
The children’s eyes grew even wider. “The Crocodile ate your hand?” the boy gasped.
“Aye, lad. And ever since then, she’s been following me, waiting till the time when she can get the rest of me. And you know what? Once, she almost did, but as luck would have it, I escaped.”
“How?” the little girl asked, enthralled.
But their names were called, and they both jumped and rushed over to the bed with their mother, who proceeded to scold them for bothering me and James.
The woman turned to us. “We thank ye for the room. We’ll be going.” The little ones groaned but followed her toward the door.
“You can have the room,” I said.
“Miss, I don’t want to intrude no further.”
“We insist, you can have it. We don’t need it anymore. Just let us get changed, and it’s yours.”
Tears filled the woman’s eyes. “Ye’re so kind. Thank ye.”
The mother ushered her children outside and shut the door.
“How did you escape the Crocodile?” I asked.
“I’m pretty sure she let me escape,” he said. There was confusion in his voice, like he wasn’t sure himself.
“Peter said you died. That the Crocodile got you.”
“She did get me.” He sighed. “And some day, she will again. There’s this odd ticking clock in my head when she is near, like time is counting down. Someday that ticking will stop, and my time will be up.”
He rose, shedding us of our blanket. He held out his hand to me, giving me a gentle smile. “But it”s not today.”
I took his hand and let him pull me to my feet, then hurried over to my clothes, pulling them on. James buttoned my dress while I laced up my boots. I turned to watch him step into his trousers, wishing that we hadn’t been interrupted the previous evening.
I averted my gaze. Since when did I allow myself to have such thoughts about the captain of the Jolly Roger? But last night had felt like the very continents themselves had shifted between us.
Moving over to my throwing knives, I slipped them into their spots, stashing a couple in my boots, another on a holder on my thigh, and the final one between my breasts.
When I turned, I realized James watched me, heat in his eyes, his shirt hanging from his hook. A slow smile played on his lips. “I could watch you do that all day.”
A small laugh escaped me at the pleasurable tingle that fluttered in my stomach. I loved how he looked at me. Like he’d also like nothing better than to finish what we started last night.
Clearing my throat, I moved close to him and lifted his shirt. “Let me help you.”
He gave a slow nod, and I held it while he slipped his arms inside, pulling it over his brace, his tattoos disappearing under the fabric. Touching his waist, I urged him to face me. He did, and before I shifted the front of his shirt over his muscled chest, I paused, staring at the double line of swirling ink marks that traveled down it. Without thinking, I reached up and ran a finger over one column of ink. It looked like a list of random letters.
“What do these mean?” I asked softly.
His gaze blackened, those blue eyes a sea of turbulence. “They are the first letters of the names of the men I’ve killed.”
My finger froze.
I swallowed, my mouth dry. “You mean the men Pan made you kill?”
He didn’t move, but the darkness in his expression intensified. “Pan is sadistic. And I seemed to be his favorite target. He can make you think whatever he wants. Make it feel perfectly logical. And even if you fight against him, he will force you in the end and then harass you with thoughts that it was your idea. That he was doing what I wanted to do in the first place. Don’t get me wrong, I always knew when he was in my mind, but during that time everything was always so muddled. After so many years of that, I…” His jaw clenched, but I saw through the anger to the vulnerability underneath. “... Sometimes it was hard to tell if it was me or him.”
A pang ran through me. I couldn’t judge him. I’d never been enslaved, toyed with, turned into an unwilling murderer at the whim of another. “James,” I whispered.
He stepped back from my touch. “And it wasn’t Pan controlling me last night when I killed those men, when I took out my first mate. He kept coming, Wendy.” James’s voice shook. A man about to break. “He wouldn’t stop. He…” He straightened and jerked his shirt down, his breaths releasing fast. “You need to know that there isn’t anything I won’t do to free Neverland of Pan’s power.”
There was a warning in his tone. I should be concerned, but even though I couldn’t understand everything he had been through, I did understand his determination, his desperation.
I would do anything to find my brothers and bring them home.
He stepped past me and scooped up the dagger, placing it in his belt, pulling his shirt over it. I frowned. I had wanted to hold on to it.
The way he moved across the room with such stilted purpose—in that moment, I saw the captain of the Jolly Roger I had always seen. But now I sensed what lay underneath. A man. A wounded man.
He yanked open the door and nodded to the frigid outside. “It is time to move on to what comes next, Wendy Darling.”
I stepped out into the snow and began to shiver. James’s coat fell heavily on my shoulders, and I shifted it close around me, casting him a grateful glance.
He pulled the door shut, turned to the woman and children that were waiting nearby, and handed them the key. “It”s yours for as long as you need.”
“Thank ye, sir. Thank ye.”
The children waved shyly, and a small smile curved James’s lips as he waved back with his hook.
“And what comes next?” I asked as we moved away.
He glanced at me out of the corner of his eye. The children seemed to have sapped some of his gloom from him. “Can’t save the world without a hearty breakfast.”
“I’m not acquainted with any establishments on this side of town.” Or one willing to take us in our current states of dress.
“I know a place,” James said.
We walked to the landlord’s door and told him about the family that was taking our room. He reluctantly agreed.
Then James took me to a small bakery. The smells of fresh bread and sugary goods made my stomach roar with hunger.
He sat at my table, offering me a plate of biscuits and a mug of warm tea. He held his own steaming mug in his hand. “I have a credit.” He smiled. “Last time I ate here, I paid with a diamond, so they still owe me.”
I breathed in the delectable smells wafting up toward me. “You’re spoiling me.”
He stared at his own food with satisfaction. “We have a big day ahead of us. Now that we have the dagger, we need to collect the spellbook of Stardust and face off against Pan.”
The hunger in my stomach soured. “With all of Neverland under his control.”
His look was grim. “Eat up.”
I took a bite of the warm buttery bread that came along with the biscuits and suppressed a groan of pleasure. “And get my brothers back,” I reminded him.
“As per our deal. But one step at a time. Here.” He set down his mug and handed me the pickleweed root from his pocket.
My eyes widened. After everything that had happened, I’d forgotten to ask him about it. I took it from him and popped the lid on the potion bottle hanging from the line around my neck.
“Just place it in and let it dissolve, then after about half an hour, it will be ready,” he said. He watched me slide it inside and re-stoppered the vial. “Before we do anything,” he continued, “we must get on board the Jolly Roger, probably with my crew crawling all over its decks, and retrieve the book.”
“It contains the spell that will cause the magic to flow out of Pan into the dagger?”
“Precisely. It is only when the dagger and book are in one another’s presence that the spell can be enacted.”
“So how do we climb on board and get it without getting caught?”
He took a sip of his steaming tea. “That is the question.”
I bit my lip, considering. I needed the book and the dagger to get my brothers. Would Pan stand in the way of retrieving it if he believed I was under his thumb? I doubted it. But James didn’t know that. He couldn’t know that I planned on giving the dagger and book over to Pan in exchange for my brothers. Damn it, he was going to hate me, wasn’t he? But if I had to choose, my brothers always won out.
At least James would remain free, thanks to his half of the stone. I wasn’t sure if I could go through with it otherwise.
Maybe I could convince him to leave Neverland with me once I found my brothers. And he’d realized he’d lost… No, he’d never give up. He’d said as much.
I’d have to worry about all of this later.
Whatever plan we came up with to get onboard the Jolly Roger, it needed to be both obvious and subtle. Obvious to Peter that he should play along, and subtle enough that James would think it could work. My gaze fell to where the dagger lay hidden, tucked beneath his shirt.
“When you first tried to take the dagger from me, you used some sort of illusory magic.”
James’s head raised, his eyes flickering with recognition. “Yes.”
“I don’t suppose you know how to do that again?”
“Unfortunately, that glamor magic cannot be performed with only verbal incantation. It requires the nectar from a never flower and the first cut lock of a newborn babe.”
“You remember these spells pretty well.”
“Since I can’t be carrying the book everywhere, I’ve memorized the most useful ones.”
I leaned back in my chair, skeptical. “I’ve no idea where to find the first lock of a newborn.”
“Fortunately for us,”—a devilishly clever grin lit his face—”I know where we can find the ingredients.”
The magical black market that I had frequented for years was busy today. People shifted within the thin alleyway in their shawls and hats, stopping at different booths, talking discreetly, despite the others shoving past.
“We are going to find what we need here?” I asked.
James nodded. “Most definitely.” He moved about as if he had been here a thousand times. He looked up and down the row, searching.
“I don’t understand,” I said. “Why would any of these places carry the first cut lock of a newborn baby?”
He lifted his elbow. “Take my arm, love. It is a bit crowded today.” I did, looping my forearm through his, and he pulled me along through the gaggle of people. “To answer your question, the first cut lock of a babe contains a very potent kind of magic. It is innocent, pure, untarnished.” He frowned a little. I wondered if he was thinking about the babe that he had abandoned.
“The Dagger of Forgotten Souls never indicated that these booths ever had magic.”
“Ah, but you cannot release the magic from certain ingredients until after they are mixed, or an enchantment is applied. Only then is the power set free. Here we are.”
He stepped up to a booth that advertised “Lovely Locks.”
James leaned in to speak with the ancient man who stood behind an assortment of human and animal hair contained in a large glass case. The wrinkly man flashed a smile, revealing several gaps among rotting teeth.
James reached into his coat that I wore and pulled out a gem, slipping it into his trouser pocket.
While James haggled with the man, I saw the young woman I had tried to help the last time that I was there. She still held her raggedy shawl around her shoulders, shivering, gaunt, close to death. I reached into the pocket of James’s large overcoat and traced my finger over the final gem. Throwing one last glance at James, I headed over to the woman.
“Do you have any matches?” I asked.
“Matches, miss?”
“Yes. I need matches.”
“I don’t usually sell those, miss, but…” She placed a hand into her pocket and lifted out a half-used match set. “This is all I have.”
“That will do perfectly.” I held out the small emerald.
The woman’s eyes grew round. “Oh, no miss, I could never…”
“I insist.” I pushed the emerald at her. The woman gripped the matches, her fingers poking through her hole-riddled gloves. Then she swiftly snatched the emerald up and shoved the matches at me.
“I and my children thank you kindly, miss,” the woman whispered.
I nodded in response and headed over to where James held two tiny locks in his palm.
He frowned at the hair. “This won’t get us far. One transformation each. We better make the most of it.”
Reaching down, he moved to place them into the pocket of the coat I wore, and froze. “I seem to be missing a gem, lass.”
“Yes,” I said. “There was a woman over there, struggling to get by, and I thought she could use it, so I exchanged a gem for some matches, and I—”
He spun me toward him and kissed me. I rose on my toes, kissing him in return, the warmth of his lips melting everything surrounding us into a blur of nothing.
He drew back, and I stared into his forget-me-not eyes, my heart burning.
A sadness mixed with the desire in his gaze. “I believe it is time, Wendy Darling. Shall we go to Neverland and save it from the despot that is Pan?”
My stomach lurched. When I got to Neverland and I had the book and Dagger of Forgotten Souls in my possession, I’d have to abandon James. Abandon everything that was developing between us. But I nodded. “Let us fly.”
He led me to the alleyway, into an alcove that was out of sight from everyone else. “We go straight up. It”s overcast so it won’t be far till we reach cover. Do you have a happy thought?”
I shut my eyes and pushed my guilty thoughts away, focusing on how it felt to have James’s lips on mine. “I have one.”
“Is it me?”
My eyes shot open, and I looked at him in shock. “I—um, of course not.”
That dashing grin spread across his face, and he threw back his head and laughed. He rose into the air, holding out his hand.
I took it and rose with him. My other hand closed around the silver stone at my neck, grateful that it shielded me from Pan’s power. That James had willingly shared that protection with me. We flew upwards, passing the clouds, leaving it all behind, letting the daylight fade as we became veiled in stars and silver.