Chapter 19 His Sweet Poison
Chapter Nineteen
His Sweet Poison
The forest is wrong.
Too dark. Too still. The trees lean inward like voyeurs, their branches arched low, their roots gnarled and wet beneath my bare feet. I’m running—always running—but the ground stretches on forever, soaked with rain, swallowing the sound of my steps.
My breath snags.
Something is behind me.
Red eyes bloom in the dark—dozens, then hundreds—each pair locked on me. Unblinking.
The shadow beasts don’t make a sound. They move like smoke, slipping between trees, massive and monstrous. Their fur swallows the light. Their talons carve the earth. I can feel them gaining ground, their silence louder than any howl.
My heart pounds up into my throat. My legs burn. My lungs splinter. Still I run.
Branches rake my arms. My dress tears. My hair snags and yanks and pulls. The forest fights me—grabbing, dragging, refusing to let me go.
A low growl shakes the trees.
I glance back.
One of the beasts lunges so fast it blurs, jaws gaping, red mist curling from its fangs. It misses me by a hair’s breadth. Another follows. Then another. The forest explodes into chaos, teeth and claws, a seething storm of crimson.
I open my mouth to scream, but no sound escapes my lips. My voice is gone, swallowed by the darkness, by my own fear.
Why won’t he help me?
I trip. The hard ground catches me, mud splashing over me. My breath chokes off in a gasp.
The eyes close in—closer, closer—ringing me like fire.
Then I see him.
Peter Pan.
At least… I think it’s him.
He stands between the beasts and me, his smile slow and wicked. Blood-red runes burn across his skin, pulsing to a rhythm I feel in my bones. His eyes glint like the beasts’, predatory and frightful.
Yet beautiful.
I reach for him.
I jolt awake, gasping, heart thrashing in my chest like a trapped bird.
The room is dim, the window limned with the bruised light of dawn. Peter’s arm is flung across my abdomen, heavy, pinning me in place. The scent of him is everywhere—pine and musk. It clings to me like the dream.
I lie still, every inch of me slick with sweat, my breath coming in shallow bursts.
I need to get out of here.
* * *
The sky hangs low and gray, a heavy lid pressed over the world. The beach—normally golden and sun-warmed—is cold this morning. Wind-scoured and stripped of color and warmth. Waves crash against the shore in relentless succession, their roar deafening.
It’s strange. In Neverland, the sun is always shining, and the air is always sweet. But today, it feels as though the whole island is braced for something. Or mourning something already lost.
I walk barefoot along the edge of the sea, the hem of my dress sodden, my toes sinking into sand that clings like memory. I slipped from Peter’s bed as quietly as I could manage. I needed to escape. To think without his suffocating presence.
The wind bites at my cheeks and tugs at my hair, pushing against my chest with invisible hands, like the island wants to keep me from slipping too far from Peter.
I trail my fingers over broken shells, driftwood, tangled seaweed. The sea stretches wide and empty before me, but I know better. The sea in Neverland isn’t endless—it circles back on itself, returning everything that tries to leave.
There’s no escape from this place. Not unless you can fly.
I swallow hard against the ache in my throat—an echo of his hand there. My fingers drift down to my hips, brushing the tender places where his grip had been the hardest, where his touch left marks.
A shiver rolls through me at the memory. At the dark thrill it sparked.
And then comes the inevitable shame.
Because I like it.
It’s almost cruel, the way everything turned out. Once, I imagined my reunion with Peter Pan would be soft. Bittersweet, maybe, but kind. I pictured him as I remembered—mischievous, bright-eyed, wild in a way that made the world feel like a game. He wasn’t cruel, nor terrifying.
I used to believe love was gentle. Composed of warm looks and sweet gestures. Safety. It was the love I thought I wanted. But that isn’t the kind of love that calls to me now.
His gaze is possessive. His smile, wicked. His touch, bruising. It’s an all-encompassing, devouring love that makes me crave him.
Sometimes I wonder if I was always meant for this. To be broken open and remade by a monster like him. Because surely, if I wasn’t meant to love him, I wouldn’t… right?
Or maybe it doesn’t matter who he is. Gentle or cruel, man or beast—maybe my love for Peter Pan was always inevitable. Maybe I was made to love him, no matter what he became.
I think of Tinker Bell.
I replay every encounter, every glare, and venomous word. Each one fits together like pieces of a riddle I never bothered to solve. But now… now I see her more clearly. And in a way, I can almost relate to.
I understand the way she lashes out. The way her rage simmers so close to the surface. Love makes you powerless. But love denied? That strips you bare.
I can only imagine the ache of yearning and being met with silence. Of giving everything, only to go unseen, ignored. And for a moment, I pity her. Because if Peter ever turned from me—if he ever withheld the attention he gives so fiercely—I don’t know what I’d do.
Maybe I’d unravel too.
And then there’s Finn. Sweet, steady Finn. His love might be the purest thing in this twisted place, and yet it’s met with scorn. He reaches for Tinker Bell with open hands, and she meets him with silence.
Will that love break him, too, in the end?
A sudden gust of wind snaps at my dress, jolting me back to myself. The waves crash louder now, churning against the sand like something angry.
I glance toward the horizon, and through the shifting mist, I spot a silhouette in the distance. Faint, but unmistakable.
Hook’s ship.
A shiver licks up my spine. I scan the beach, but it’s empty, just wind and waves and the distant cry of gulls.
They’re probably just passing by.
Probably.
Still, unease coils low in my stomach. I should head back soon.
My thoughts drift to Thorne—the way his gaze had locked onto Hook like he couldn’t look away. And Hook, for all his usual menace, had stared back with something startlingly close to fondness. Not soft, exactly, but not cruel either. The hatred he always wore had faltered, if only for a heartbeat.
Peter hadn’t noticed. Or maybe he had and chose to ignore it. But there was something between them.
There are stories on this island no one is telling. Histories are buried like bones beneath the earth. Half-truths threaded with desire and laced with danger. There seems to be something in Neverland… something in all of us… that aches for ruin.
And all of it, every tightly held secret, leads back to Peter Pan.
Hook’s words echo in my skull like a curse: How very foolish of you to return to this endless hell.
He’d said it bitterly, with pity almost.
And then there were the runes—those strange, golden marks that burned into the earth beneath me when Peter lost control.
That burned into his skin. Into mine. I had felt them sear their way through my body like a brand.
Saw Neverland obey him. Felt it hold me there, chain me to the dirt for him.
When he realized I could see them, his reaction wasn’t confusion. It was shock, distress, even.
He knows what they are, but he won’t tell me.
My mind replays what I saw at the masquerade—the way he launched himself at the shadow beasts, moving like a star hurtling through the sky.
Beautiful and catastrophic. They had been monstrous, oozing red runes nearly identical to his.
But theirs bled crimson, writhing like a terrible wound.
Their black fur moved like smoke, their eyes glowing like embers. And Peter…
He hadn’t looked human.
He had torn them apart with his bare hands. Every movement brutal. Reveling in his own violence. A feral grin stretched across his face, and I’d felt the breath catch in my lungs, not only from horror, but awe.
I swore I had heard Neverland cry out for me. Even felt its heartbeat echoing under my skin.
What did it all mean? And why was Peter hiding the truth?
He holds his secrets close, guarding them like a jealous god. He gives me his body, his devotion, his obsession—but not the truth.
And the worst part?
I allow him to keep me in the dark because I’m not the girl I was. Some days, I can’t even find her in the shape of myself. Pleasure and pain have bled together. His approval has begun to matter more than my own voice.
I used to be brave. Clever. Kind.
Now I moan for the monster who marks my body.
I try to remember my mother’s voice. My father’s face.
My friends’ laughter. But they slip from my mind like water through cupped hands.
All I can think about is Peter’s smile. The way the island bends around him.
The longer I stay, the quieter the outside world becomes.
It’s like his shadow curls through my mind, dimming everything but him, swallowing me whole.
A crunch of sand cuts through my thoughts. I look up—
And freeze.
Captain Hook is walking toward me along the beach, one gloved hand raised in greeting, the other a gleaming hook held slightly away from his body, as if to show he bears no threat. For now, at least.
I take a stumbling step back, heart hammering. My muscles coil tight, ready to bolt for the woods at the first sign of danger.
“Miss Darling,” he drawls, the grin sliding easily onto his face. “May I just say—you’ve grown into quite the beautiful young lady.”
I swallow hard. His words crawl over me like insects.
“What do you want, Hook?” I ask, trying to keep my voice steady. Trying to play at being brave.
“Nothing, dear. I come with advice,” he says lightly. “A rare kindness from your favorite villain.”
I arch a brow. “Not here to kidnap me, then? No schemes? No grand plot to use me against Peter?”
His grin widens, flashing teeth. “I thought I’d try Plan A first. But don’t worry—I’m always ready to fall back on Plan B.”
I glare, folding my arms across my chest. “You haven’t changed.”
“You’ve got me there,” he says, his smile sharpening, “How can one change when they remain ageless? When Neverland keeps us all frozen in time. And yet—Peter Pan grew up.”
He turns slowly in place, gesturing to the sea, the sky, the ragged coastline. “Somehow, Neverland has changed.” His gaze snaps back to mine, eyes bright. “You feel it too, don’t you? This place—it’s rotting. And our own dear Peter Pan, well, he’s the poison.”
His voice drops, turning almost intimate. “He is the sickness. The rot in the root. My purpose here has never shifted. Kill him, and maybe Neverland dies.” He smiles then, cruel and cold. “Or maybe—just maybe—it heals.”
Peter... dead?
The very idea makes something inside me recoil, clawing for breath. The possibility of him gone, of Neverland without him, is wrong. Like the ground would vanish beneath my feet. Like the air itself would refuse to fill my lungs.
Somehow, I know without a shadow of a doubt, there is no Neverland without Peter Pan.
“Just leave us alone, Hook,” I say, but the words tremble on my lips.
He watches me carefully, his expression unreadable now. “Haven’t you wondered where that cursed shadow of his went? Why the beasts walk among us now? I bet there are truths he won’t share with you, girl. But I have my suspicions.”
He takes a menacing step forward. “We could save this place, you and I. Think on it, Wendy. Or I’ll be forced to take a more… ruthless route.”
I don’t wait to hear what that entails. I turn and run.
My feet slap against the wet sand, breath tearing ragged from my lungs as I sprint toward the path.
My heart hammers, wild and unrelenting, a war drum behind my ribs.
Wind lashes my face, sharp and cold, and tears sting my eyes—whether from fear or fury or something else entirely, I can’t begin to say.
Hook’s words echo like a curse in my skull.
Peter’s shadow.
I’d noticed its absence immediately, hadn’t I? A flicker of unease in the back of my mind. But I’d dismissed it and brushed it aside like so many other things in this place, too distracted by Peter himself to question what was missing.
How foolish of me.
How utterly short-sighted.
He has wrapped my thoughts in him like silk, knotted my mind until I can barely think of anything but the curve of his mouth, the heat of his hands, the ache he stirs in me. He has eclipsed everything else.
But now that I think of it, I haven’t seen Peter’s shadow once since my return.
And that begs the question: Where is it?
At the edge of the forest path, I stumble to a halt, chest heaving. I throw a glance over my shoulder, scanning the mist-choked shoreline, heart still stuttering with adrenaline.
But he’s gone. Not a footprint in the sand, or a whisper on the wind. As if he were never there at all.
I press a trembling hand to my chest, trying to calm the panic rising in my throat.
I don’t want to live in a Neverland without Peter Pan.
And worse—far, far worse.
A darker thought slithers through me, slick and shameful, curling tight around my heart.
I don’t want to live without him at all.