Chapter 40
CHAPTER 40
WENDY
T he Nomad demands to meet with us separately before we leave.
“To ensure your stories match. The Nomad doesn’t like to be double-crossed,” the servant says in explanation as he comes to retrieve me. Astor protests the idea initially, but when I remind him he isn’t responsible for my well-being, he backs off, just as shocked by my forwardness as I am.
When I arrive, the Nomad peers up from his desk, tucking his magnifying glass away as he gestures for the servant to shut the door on his way out. I can’t help but notice that he’s been examining the sketch of the Reaper and the Oak.
“What details do you want to know?” I ask, but the Nomad waves my words away.
“That’s not what I called you in here for,” he says. My chest tightens as he gestures to the seat across from him. “Don’t worry, Miss Darling. I’m sure you’ll find this meeting to your benefit.”
I stand with my back still pressed to the door, though I’m fairly sure the servant locked it behind him. My mind flashes back to evenings in my parents’ parlor, to men so certain that I was enjoying myself. So confident that I was lucky to have their hands all over me. “Forgive me if I don’t trust your assumption of what will be to my benefit.”
For a moment, the Nomad almost looks serious. “I’ll let you determine that for yourself, then. But please. Sit.”
I nod, ambling toward the chair and taking it. The Nomad doesn’t sit. Instead, he navigates to the front of his desk, leaning his back against it as he crosses his feet. “You’re not here to rid the captain of his Mark.”
I shake my head. “How did you know?”
“Because I fail to see how that benefits you. Though if I’ve missed something, please enlighten me.”
I bite the inside of my cheek. At least the Nomad hasn’t seemed to catch on to the feelings I’m attempting to quash for the captain, though I’m surprised he’s that oblivious. Perhaps my face doesn’t show as much as I fear it does.
“I’m here for my Mate,” I say, folding my hands in my lap and stretching them out as I interlock them. When the Nomad glances at the sketch, I amend my statement. “Not…not that one. Peter. He was cursed by a Fate. He can’t feel pain.”
The Nomad brow quirks at that. “Are you a lover scorned, then? Distraught that you can’t inflict the same pain he caused you by having relations with the faerie who carved your face to pieces?”
I let out a nervous chuckle, rubbing my palms against my thighs. “No, nothing like that. I don’t want to hurt my Mate. I just…well, he can’t love me, can he? Not truly. Not without the ability to feel pain.”
The Nomad taps his finger against the desk. “Is that what love is to you, Miss Darling? Pain?”
My throat goes dry. “No. But one cannot love without experiencing pain of some sort. He bargained me away because he couldn’t feel the pain of losing me. Not like I felt for him,” I say, clutching my chest, reaching within for how it felt like it was being rent in two when we left Neverland. Strange, but I can’t seem to remember the sensation that once felt so agonizing. Even so, my connection to Peter is still there, a strand of magic, half of what a normal Mating Mark might be, but tethering all the same.
“Hm,” says the Nomad, staring down at the sketch next to him. “And you’re sure your Mate wishes to be set free of his curse?”
“It’s a curse, isn’t it? They’re meant to be broken.”
“You’d be surprised, Miss Darling, how many mortals prefer to make pets of their curses.”
I shake my head. “Not Peter. Peter would choose to be free if he could.”
The Nomad’s mouth curves at the edges. “He would choose pain? To love you more fully?”
“Just because you can’t comprehend that kind of love doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist,” I snap.
The Nomad’s laugh chills my bones. “You have no idea the pain I’ve subjected myself to—time and time again—just for a taste of that sort of high. But you know about highs, don’t you?”
Again, the taste of faerie dust blooms on my tongue. When I don’t answer, he says, “So you choose this Peter, then? How unfortunate for Captain Astor.”
I snort. “The captain prefers to cage himself in the past.”
The Nomad’s blue eyes widen, and even I am surprised by the bitterness in my voice. Unsettled, I find myself softening. “If the captain wishes to be rid of me, who am I to stop him? Why would I choose someone who refuses to choose me?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” says the Nomad. “Surely you can admit there’s fun in the chase.”
“I don’t want to chase,” I say. “My feet are too tired for that.”
“Very well, then,” he says. “I believe you and I could be mutually beneficial to one another. You see, I’d quite like to have a faerie dust supplier of my own. When you break your Mate’s curse and return to Neverland to secure your happy ending, I want you to turn the faerie over to me. I’ll even be generous and give you an entire year to do it.”
“I doubt I’ll be able to catch her,” I say.
The Nomad shrugs. “Then convince your Mate to do it. Surely with his curse broken, he’ll be so pleased with you, he’ll do whatever you ask.”
I can’t tell if he’s taunting me or not. “Fine, but I want two years,” I say, to which the Nomad grimaces but doesn’t object. “Now how do I break the curse?”
“I myself am ignorant of such matters, but in a few moments, I’m going to call your captain in here and tell him that there’s a dead Seer in the Cave of Endor who knows the spell to remove his Mark.”
“And is that true?” I ask.
The Nomad’s eyes twinkle. “What is it to you?”
I sit back in my chair, listening as the Nomad continues, “What’s relevant to you is that this Seer has the magic to break your Mate’s curse.”
“And how am I supposed to talk to a dead Seer?”
“There’s a spell,” he says, leaning in and whispering it in my ear. I shiver at the sound of the ancient words in my ear, but commit them to memory all the same.
“Now,” he says, holding out his hand. “Do we have a bargain?”
When I take the Nomad’s hand, something stings at the back of my neck. At the same time, he presses a cold object to my hand. “You’ll be needing this,” he says. “A calling stone. You can use it to bind the Seer to this world. Just don’t drop it.” He flashes me a smile that I’m unable to interpret as either sincere or teasing.
Then, as if the Nomad had merely been speaking to himself and not another person inhabiting the room, he returns to the sketches at his desk.
Considering myself dismissed, I make to abscond from the room, but as I rise from my seat, the Nomad addresses me, though without looking up from his papers. “Oh, and do be careful, Miss Darling. Spirits only have a limited amount of magic to offer after they die. What you and the captain want—there won’t be enough magic for both. If I were you, I wouldn’t use the Seer’s magic lightly.”
The contents of my stomach harden to concrete, the pressure of what’s at stake threatening to make me sluggish. A servant soon comes to fetch me, then leads me to a parlor where Astor is waiting, foot perched on his opposite knee, which he’s bouncing erratically. If he greets me with his expression, I’m intentionally ignorant of it, because I turn my attention to a painting on the wall, fixing my gaze on its ghastly depiction of a vast wasteland.
The servant leads Astor out of the room for his meeting with the Nomad. My foot taps against the floorboards. Uneasy as I am being complicit in deceiving Astor, I’m weary of sacrificing for people who aren’t willing to sacrifice for me. Still, when he returns to get me from the parlor, I open my mouth, then quickly shut it, realizing I’d rather my deception be silent than spoken.
On the way out, a servant bumps into me, knocking me into Astor’s arms. His arms grip around my shoulders as he stares into my eyes. I can’t tell if it’s an apology written there, or just resignation.