Chapter 12
Chapter
Twelve
“Are you sure there’s a village out there?” Even with a full moon, I can’t make out anything that looks like a village on the shore.
“I’m certain, lass.” Hook rows steadily toward the beach as Starkey, Widow, and Shiner trail along behind us in the second boat. The others wait on the Jolly Roger. They’ll have to take turns in the row boats. “Look down in the water.”
I lean over the side of the boat and gasp at the luminous pearls and gems that dot the ocean floor. “They’re so pretty.”
“The fae value them greatly, but to take one is a sin. We don’t disturb them.”
“Ari had these.”
“She’s queen of the mermaids and can do as she likes in her ocean, but the rest of us know better than to touch fae treasure.”
“Did you know about her and Wraith?” I ask.
He nods. “Theirs is a sad story, but it happened so long ago that I’ve forgotten most of it. That’s the way it is with Neverland. Stories layered on top of each other until you don’t know who’s a hero and who’s a villain.”
“Maybe someone can be both.” I give him a pointed look.
He scoffs. “I’m all villain, lass. You’ll find that out as soon as the Spinner fixes you up.” The salacious glint in his eye is so damn sexy. What am I going to do with him?
The rowboat glides into the sand, and Hook jumps out and hoists me above the surf, carrying me to the dry beach.
When he puts me on my feet, I look around, still trying to make out a village, still failing.
“Where is it?” Starkey calls as his rowboat lands beside ours.
“Right? I can’t see a thing.” I shrug.
“Let’s go.” Hook takes my hand and leads me up the gentle slope beneath a few palm trees. The terrain turns greener at an impossibly quick pace, and before we’ve even gone ten steps, there’s moss beneath our feet and trees towering overhead.
“How?” I gaze around as buildings come into view, their architecture soaring and airy. “This must be some serious magic.”
“It is.” He leads me forward until we’re walking along a cobblestone street with glowing green moss along the sides.
The fairy village is beautiful but silent. I don’t even hear the murmur of bugs or the call of wild things from the forest. It’s … dead.
A wide arch crosses over the pathway ahead of us, and flowery vines curl around it and hang down in a perfumed curtain.
Statues stand at either side of it—children with butterflies in their hair.
And beyond is a grand fountain with a mermaid atop it, though the water no longer flows.
It’s as quiet as the rest of the buildings here.
“They’re all gone,” I whisper. A gnawing melancholy settles inside me as I look around at the cream-colored houses with thatch roofs.
There are no families inside, no children running around, no music, no life.
It’s unnatural. Even the air has a clammy feeling, as if it clings to me with tendrils of dread.
“Here, lass. Let me carry you.” Hook reaches for me.
“No. I need to do this on my own.” I put up a hand. “I have to see it through.” I hurt all over, and I’m already winded, but if I’m going to find the Spinner, I have to do it on my own two feet.
He looks to argue, then takes a breath and my hand. “All right. We’ll do it your way.”
We keep going past several houses and what looks to have been a creative district. Windows are lined with seashells, and mannequins inside wear ornate clothing that I’m certain would impress even Nessie.
The glowing green moss lights the way past the town and deeper into some rolling hills where farmhouses stand in disrepair, the small fields around them growing wild.
Farther still, the road narrows and turns into hard-packed dirt.
When we come to a rise, I look up to find a set of jagged mountains, the tops dusted with white and veins of silver glinting in the moonlight.
They’re something from a dream, a beautiful vista of sharp edges and cold beauty.
“Have a rest.” Hook eases me onto a stone bench at the roadside, then strides off toward Starkey.
They have a whispered conversation as Shiner and Widow come over to me.
“It’s sad.” I stare at the nearest farmhouse, the front door off its hinges and the inside dark. “It feels like there’s so much missing.”
“There is.” Widow sits beside me. “This should be a village with hundreds of fae. Now, there’s no one.”
“I thought we’d find the Spinner.” I glance at Hook. From the look on his face, I can tell he thought we should’ve found her by now, too. “She was supposed to be here. But there’s no one.”
“Maybe she’s fled to the mountains.” Shiner leans on a fence post. “We have enough supplies to do an expedition into the foothills, at the very least.”
“She doesn’t have time for an expedition,” Widow says quietly.
Shiner turns to me, her face falling somewhat. “Yeah. You’re right.”
“I look that bad, huh?” I let Widow pull me to her side. Resting my head on her shoulder, I close my eyes.
“We’re going to figure this out, my darling.” Widow presses her cheek to my crown. “We have to.”
I take that as a ‘yes, you look that bad.’
“Where the fuck is she?” Hook yells, desperation in his plea.
“How should I know?” Starkey throws his hands up.
“Go back through the village. Tell the crew to go house by house. Look everywhere. Find her.”
“Yes, Captain.” Starkey turns and takes off at a run.
Hook stalks toward me, then stops, taking a deep breath.
It makes my lips twitch—the way he reins in his temper before he gets anywhere near me.
“We’ll find her.” He moves to my side and rests his gaze on the mountains. “She’s here. She has to be here.”
“But what if she’s not?” I take his hand.
He shakes his head. “Don’t talk like that, lass.”
I ask the question that I know he’s been thinking. “If my mother couldn’t find her, what chance did I really have?”
“This isn’t over.” He pulls me away from Widow and into his lap. “Don’t give up, lass.” He grips my jaw lightly and forces me to look at him. “Promise me you won’t give up.”
I want to say the words, but I don’t want to lie to him. Not now.
“Lass, please.” His eyes water.
It destroys me in ways I never knew existed. “I’m okay,” I say, my body shaking. “It’s going to be okay.”
“No.” He bites the word. “It won’t. If you’re not here, nothing will be okay. Fight, Moira. I need you to be brave.”
I want to be brave, but I don’t think I am.
“You have to be brave for me, lass. I need you.” He cradles me close to his chest, and I realize we’re alone. Shiner and Widow are checking the farmhouses, everyone on Hook’s crew desperately searching for the Spinner.
I close my eyes again and breathe him in. His strong arms hold me close as my mind drifts off. The walk took more out of me than I realized, my limbs heavy, my heart sluggish.
“Lass.” Hook’s voice comes to me through a tunnel, a long, dark one. “Wake up, Moira!”
“There you are.” A golden pop bursts in front of my eyes.
I jump to my feet and stumble backwards into one of the abandoned fields. “What the hell?” I reach for my sword, but I don’t have one. Not since I was in Peter’s cage.
Another golden flash, and a fairy appears before me, her hair so black it looks blue and her skin a light brown.
She floats above the ground, her golden wings beating lazily.
Her pearly dress is gossamer and thin, a beautiful thing unadorned except for its own glossy thread.
Above all else, I notice that I’m not afraid of her, even though her eyes glow like white opal and she has two fangs that graze her bottom lip.
“Are you the Spinner?” I get to my feet.
“I am.” She floats around me, giving me an appraising look. “And so are you.”
“So it’s true? I’m from your line?”
“You’re fae.” She moves closer and runs a finger down my spine. “And you’re a Spinner, but your line is far, far older than mine. Your ancestors were here when the island was new, just a babe waking in its mother’s arms.”
My skin tickles on my shoulder blades, and I dart forward, away from her strange touch. “What are you doing?”
“Just seeing.” She shrugs and moves to my front again, her sandaled feet still not touching the ground.
“Wait.” I look around. “Where’s Hook and the others?”
“They’re awake.” She points.
I spin to find Hook sitting on the bench, me in his arms as he rocks me and sings about dreams for sale. The amount of pain in him, the way his head hangs, my heart breaks again and again.
“Can he hear us?”
“No.” She floats to my side.
“Am I dead?”
“Not yet.”
“But soon?” I meet her gaze.
“Yes.” She dips her chin. “You’re fading. Peter has made sure of it.” Her face sours, her eyes flashing. “He drained so many of us once he visited the heart of the island and came out changed.”
“Why? I need answers, and I need you to fix me. I have to fight him, to stop him from hurting anyone else.”
She sighs. “If only it were that easy.”
“Look, lady, you’re flying and talking to me in a dream or something. Don’t sell yourself short. You’ve got magic. So just make it easy and heal me!”
She smiles, her face angelic save for the fangs. “I like you. Straightforward. Your mother wasn’t quite as pushy.”
“You met my mom?”
“Of course.”
“Then why didn’t you send her back to me? That’s what she wanted, right?”
“She asked to be sent back to the mainland with no more waking dreams of Neverland. I couldn’t give her that.”
“Why not?”
“Because there are some magics I can’t undo.
Her fae legacy and the links she has to Neverland are things beyond my control.
” She shrugs, her wings flapping along with her movement.
“That’s not in my power. We are who we are, and our burdens can’t be erased without great sacrifice.
Your mother’s fae side manifested in visits to faraway lands through the gateway of her mind.
” She taps the middle of her forehead. “It was her gift.”
“It was a curse!” I yell. “She wanted to be with me. Not here!”
“That’s true.” She sighs. “She wanted that more than anything, but I told her as I must tell you. I don’t have that power. I have even less power now that Peter has drained so many fae—”
“Why didn’t you stop him?” I snap. “You’re their leader, right? You should’ve defended your people.” I know I’m lashing out. And I know it’s hit home when she winces.
Her eyes begin to glow, and she floats higher.
“You don’t think I tried?” Her voice is thunderous as a phantom wind whips around her.
“I saved as many as I could, bringing them to shelter in the mountains where they live still. But there were many more I couldn’t save.
I recite their names every time the moon rises high.
They are written here.” She beats her breast. “I failed them. Don’t you think I know that?
” Her vitriol seems to ebb as she floats back toward the ground.
“I failed all of them, because I let Peter in. I welcomed him as I’d always done, not realizing he’d taken a boon from the heart of the island. ”
“Am I his boon?”
“Yes.” Her answer is like a shot, one that tears through my heart and out the back of my soul.
Hook was wrong. I wasn’t his boon after all.
I’m not the love he wished for. That rocks me to my core, and I stand there, dumbfounded and falling apart.
The one thing I’d come to rely on, and it was only sand slipping through my fingers.
Hook’s wish is still out there somewhere, some other woman who can make him whole.
It’s not me. It was never me. Peter was right—he owns me.
Numb, I meet her gaze again. “What did Peter wish for?”
She gives me a look like I’m the biggest idiot this island has ever seen, and maybe I am. But her answer cuts deeper than her eyes ever could. “Power, of course.”
Power. Peter wished for power, and the answer to it was me. I look down at myself, at my shriveled hands and thin body. A crazed laugh barrels out of me. “Power?” I hold my hands out in front of me and stare at the thin skin lined with sinew underneath. “This isn’t power.”
“You told him stories, Moira.” She drifts all the way to the ground.
“He took your power from you. That is our gift—or as you’d call it—our curse.
Our stories have power, and if given to the wrong people, that power can be taken.
Stories are a magic of the highest order.
They can heal and unite. They can birth worlds within worlds.
But in the wrong hands, they can bring untold destruction and pain. ”
“I didn’t know. How could I have known?” I cover my face with my hands.
“You couldn’t have. That’s why you were his boon. He could use you for the power he craves.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I yell.
Her eyes flash again. “You believe the island would let me do anything after the deal had been struck?”
My head spins. “Between you and me, I think the island is sounding pretty fucking evil right now.”
“No.” Her voice is thunderous. “No.” She calms a bit, then continues, “The island was off-balance from the moment Hook went into its heart. After that, the magic attempted a course correction.”
I can’t believe she’s defending the island. “By granting Peter evil powers?”
“By giving Peter a way to continue bringing Lost Boys to the island and maintaining their eternal youth. Such was the bargain. You were the way. But Peter discovered the power granted him by the island worked in other ways, as well.”
“So the island gave him the ability to drain your people, the Guardians, and even his own Lost Boys to keep his ‘young forever’ bullshit going?”
“The island never intended for any of that. It was the result of the imbalance. Peter …” She wrings her hands. “Peter got out of control, and the island could no longer influence him as it once had. You were the intended sacrifice, but—”
“Wait!” I hold up a hand. “I was supposed to be a sacrifice?”
“Yes,” she says it like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “Peter would take your fae abilities and become a Spinner in his own right. He would have a direct link to the island’s magic and continue to lure dead children, thereby maintaining his eternal youth as well as theirs.”
“Then why didn’t he do that?” I look down at myself. “I’m still standing. He could’ve killed me a thousand times over by now.”
“Because Hook and Peter weren’t the only ones who made a bargain with the island.”
I blink several times, as if it can clear my head. “What?”
“Your mother made a deal, too. That’s why she was lost to you, why I couldn’t send her back, and why Peter has never been able to kill you.”