But lots of things, not just rocks, can be weathered.
Me, for example. Being here, being with Peter, loving Hook, it’s worn me away.
What’s left?
When I arrived, I felt like a whole person, and now that I’m here, there’s this tiny part of me that would rather die than leave. Even though I want to leave, I want to leave only to escape how being here’s made me feel, not because I don’t want to be here.
As though being here is in some way the meaning of life itself.
As though here is my fate, actually, and I’d rather die than not have it.
“Heartbreak.” Charles nods at me as he peers through the magnifying glass. “Lots of it. Innocence—a surprising amount!—considering what my nephew said of your time together.”
I glare over at him.
“You’re quite jaded. You doubt people quickly.”
“Well, people quickly give me reasons to doubt them.”
His eyes pinch. “Does the Pan love you?”
I roll my eyes. “Peter doesn’t love anyone but himself.”
“Are you sure?”
“Quite.” I give him a firm, impatient look.
He lifts an eyebrow, and some nerves rattle in my belly. “Are you protecting him?”
“Peter?” I stare at him, confused. “I am nothing to Peter. I’m his enemy.”
The Collector looks confused, and my brows bend as I stare over at him.
“Is that what you came here for?”
“To Neverland?” He tilts his head curiously before he shakes it. “No, my dear. I came here for you.”
I stare over at him, my chin tucking in against my chest. I don’t understand.
“The beauty the two princes are fighting for.”
I scoff, shaking my head at this crazy old man. “Neither of them are princes.”
His eyebrows go up. “Is that so?”
“That is so,” I tell him, sure.
He sighs. “So you don’t know the legend.”
“Of course I know the legend.” I scowl over at him.
Charles tucks some hair behind his ears and gives me a tall look. “Then you don’t know it as well as you think you do.”
I roll my eyes at him. “It’s about Peter, if anyone. It’s not about Jamison.”
He gives me a long look. “Is it not?”
“Captain James Hook wasn’t a founder,” I remind him.
At this, he nods. “He wasn’t one of the Founding Five, yes, but he was a founder.”
I cross my arms, wanting to look impatient, but now I’m a tiny bit interested. “Of what?”
“Piracy.”
At that, I roll my eyes, and he points over to me with a threatening finger.
“Don’t roll your eyes at me for your own ignorance.”
“There are no founders of piracy.”
His head pulls back. “You’ve never heard of the Republic of Pirates? 1717. Nassau, Bahamas. You know the stories. Your grandmother wrote them.” He arches an eyebrow and quotes a part of my grandma Wendy’s book. “‘If people knew who he really was, it would set the country ablaze.’”
My eyes pinch, undeniably interested now. “So who was he then?”
He lets it hang for a moment, and the suspense builds.
“Benjamin Hornigold,” he announces, and I suspect he expects more fanfare from me, but I just stare over at him, unmoved and unreactive.
He looks disappointed.
“And they called you educated.” He rolls his eyes. “He was one of the first, one of the greats, mentored Blackbeard. Loyal to his country as well, actually. He wouldn’t attack a British flying flag, but his crew didn’t much care for that, so they ousted him. He was pardoned by King George and became a pirate hunter.”
I stare, now sort of (reluctantly) riveted by it all.
“Everyone hated him. He was a dead man walking…so what did he do?” he asks, brows high. “He found a fairy. Convinced her to take him to Neverland. Faked his death—‘hurricane.’” He uses air quotes for that. “No one was any the wiser. He started up again in Neverland, founded piracy here too.” Charles shrugs.
Whoa.
“Piracy was all he was good for, really. And a poem,” he adds as an afterthought.
Could it be true? Could Jamison actually be the heir?
“You don’t believe me?” says Charles. He stands and walks to his desk, opening a drawer and pulling out a piece of paper. “November 30, 1944.” He clears his throat. “‘Brother. My son was born today to Itheelia Le Faye under a bloodred moon, if you can believe it. Quite the spectacle, the entire thing. He’s a strapping young lad. He’ll grow up to carry our name well.’ Shall I go on?”
I shake my head. “Does he know?”
“Well…” Charles shrugs. “Wouldn’t it explain how he treated you?”
I shake my head demurely. “Not really.”
“Princes are entitled,” he tells me.
“Some, perhaps,” I correct him. “But not all.”
He concedes with a sigh. “It would appear both of your princes are.”
“Neither of them are princes,” I tell him again. And then with a heavier heart, I say, “And neither of them are mine.”
His eyebrows flick up. “We shall see.”
“Please release the fairy.” I nod to her. “You can drown me afterwards.”
He gives me a pleasant smile. “In a rush to die, are we?”
I shake my head. “You just talk a lot.”
“I heard you enjoy that sort of thing.” He watches me closely as he says that, and I try my best not to let him see how that crushes me a little, but he sees it.
He sits back, pleased with himself.
Then he stands, walks over to his shelf, and plucks her jar off it.
He opens the lid slowly, carefully, assuring she can’t escape on her own, and then he picks her up by her good wing, holding her out in front of him.
“Let her go,” I tell him again, and he flicks his eyes over at me.
“In a minute.”
Then he places a teeny, tiny cloth over her whole face and starts to smother her.
She squirms to breathe, and I jump to my feet, running over to him, but he kicks me back in a manic, violent way.
I lunge for him, but he kicks me again, harder.
“Courageous.” He nods. “I’ll take that too.”
“We had a deal!”
Charles gives me a look. “I’m not killing her,” he says, staring down at me on the floor.
I pick myself up, staring over at him suspiciously.
“I can’t very well have her free and conscious now, can I?” He continues to cut off her air. “If I let her go and she’s coherent, she’ll help you.” Rune eventually goes limp in his hands, and he lays her on the table. He nods at her little body. “Come see for yourself. There’s a pulse still.”
I walk over to her and rest my pinky on her chest.
He’s right. She is still breathing.
I look at him and nod once. “Okay.”
He gestures towards the door. “Shall we?”
I take a deep breath, and I don’t even flinch when he takes my arm with his hand.
What’s that thing my grandmother always used to say Peter said?
Something about dying.
Then—smash! From behind us. Glass flies everywhere.
And standing in the window with his hands on his hips is Peter Pan.
“Unhand that girl!” Peter tells him. “She’s mine.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-FOUR
“Well.” Charles grins. “What a treat!”
He pushes his glasses up his nose, eyeing Peter as best he can in the fading light.