What is certain is that Pan lied to me about being able to return us to our world. He could, if he wanted to, but it’s becoming clearer he doesn’t. And I can’t quite make myself dismiss what the boy told me the night before. The more I think about it—the confusion on the Captain’s face when I accused him of attacking Olivia, the sureness in Fiona’s voice, even the speed at which Pan knew what had happened and where Olivia was—the more certain I am that the Captain wasn’t involved with what happened to Olivia yesterday.
But why the elaborate ploy? Was it just to get me to distrust the Captain? Or perhaps there was something more going on—some scheme to make me trust Pan. Or maybe it was some sort of test of what I am. I think about the challenge in his eyes in the caverns after the world stopped shaking, and I can’t help but wonder if I passed or failed.
I need answers, and I know there are none to be found in this empty room. I have to find Olivia. She might not remember me or the world we came from, but I remember—parts of it, at least—and I won’t give up on getting us back.
Using the wall as a brace, I make my way down the uneven steps as quickly as I can. Once I’m safely on the ground, I’m halfway across the Great Hall before I find a boy who isn’t still asleep.
“Have you seen Olivia?” I ask.
He blinks at me. At first I think he doesn’t understand, but then he heaves an irritated sigh and waves for me to follow him. He leads me through the tunnel we used the day before, back to the cavernous room where the other tunnels branch out in all directions. “The gardens,” he says, pointing to the tunnel on the far right.
“You don’t want to show me the rest of the way?” I ask hope-fully. He just glares at me and turns back toward the Great Hall.
I stare at the dark opening for a moment, wondering if I shouldn’t just go back and wait for Pan to bring me to Olivia. Maybe I’m jumping to conclusions. After all, he left the stairs, as he promised, and he said I could see her today. . . .
No. I don’t want to wait for Pan. The whole point of my finding Olivia is to get her away from him. I need to get her alone so I can try to talk some sense into her without his easy, tempting smiles pulling her away from me.
I move along at a steady pace, and when the white walls of the tunnel flare open, I find a cavernous space that houses a maze of gorgeously blooming gardens. It’s not dark here like in the rest of the fortress. The walls remind me of an opal, and the patches of multifaceted stones above me bathe the whole garden in soft light.
Everywhere I look, plants bloom in lush disarray. As in the jungle, every few seconds they begin to shift—ruffled roses the size of my hand transform into smiling snapdragons, and brilliantly colored daisies morph into the elegant fluted petals of lilies. Flowers I cannot name transform into colors I’ve never imagined.
One that draws my attention is a vining plant with fluted flowers that looks so much like something I’ve seen before. For a moment I remember seeing a flower like that, one that glowed with a strange amber-orange light. I can almost picture it. . . . But then the trumpet-shaped blossoms pull inward, and when they reemerge from the stems, they’ve transformed themselves into ruffled blossoms.
The moment is gone, and the ghost of the memory right along with it.
Still a little unsettled by my inability to really remember, I turn my attention back to the problem of the gardens. The thought of getting lost in their maze of thorny hedges and flowering trees has me hesitating. But their abundance of blossoms tells me for sure there was no reason for Olivia to venture out of the fortress yesterday. She could have found anything she wanted from the relative safety of these gardens. Which makes me even more certain than ever that Pan lied about the attack. If anything, he was the one who put her in danger by having his boys take her out to the End.
And then another thought occurs to me—maybe he did that on purpose. I think of his expression when Olivia’s voice came to us through that fog, and I’m not sure anymore if it was really relief I saw there. Maybe he never intended for Olivia to come back. . . .
Then, deep from within the lush green landscape, I hear the distant sound of familiar female laughter, and I don’t hesitate any longer. I step toward the thick wall of vegetation, looking for a way in.
Almost as if they sense my presence, the plants shift, an invitation to enter. I hesitate for another moment, wondering whether this is just another trap. Maybe this is just another way that Neverland is trying to draw me in and keep me from ever getting home. But then I hear Olivia’s laugh again, and I put aside my fear and enter the green alley of branches.