Pan's Revenge (28 page)

We wander
across the meadows to the fairy forest ahead of us. A quiet sound
follows me for a long while, but it takes some time until it sinks
in what that sound really is. I turn around and find Tami walking
close behind me, sobbing.

Putting an arm around her shoulders, I pull
her into my side. “It’s alright. The fairies will know how to help
him. They won’t let him down.” I wonder if I said this to soothe
myself more than Tami. She nods briefly, but there’s not much
confidence in that move. And then I realize what really concerns
her. It makes me stop and twist her to face me. “Peter didn’t mean
what he said up there. He wasn’t himself, Tami.”

The pixie sniffs and wipes the back of her
small hand across her nose. “He hates me.”

“No, he doesn’t. He was just…confused.”
Gently, I stroke her golden locks away from her face. “When you
were gone, he was so sad that he lost his happy thought. I know he
wanted to take all the mean things back that he said to you. And I
know he didn’t want to do all”—shrugging helplessly, I glance back
at the mountain we left behind—“that.”

“I don’t want him to die, Angel,” Tami pushes
out between sobs. “I don’t want to be without him.”

Hugging her
to my chest, I caress her hair. “And you won’t.” Then I take her
hand and tug her with me, so we don’t lose the others. As we catch
up with them, I ask Tami, “How did you and Peter meet?” I was
always curious about it, but right now it’s more of a thing to
distract Tami and myself from thoughts of doom.

She inhales
deeply and wipes her tears away. “I wasn’t born in Neverland, did
you know?”

I shake my head.

“I don’t know how to get back to the place
where I was born, but it looks like an endless forest, far away
from here. There are only pixies in that place and then some
animals that I never saw here.”

“It sounds like a beautiful place.”

“The place was beautiful, all right, but my
folks wasn’t very friendly. They are hard working people, caring
about nature, the four seasons, and the elements. Every pixie had a
special ability to bring in to our daily life. Everyone, except
me.” Her cheeks turn red with shame and she lowers her gaze to the
glimmering nails of her tiny toes. “I should have learned to
communicate with the wind, because that’s what my line did. But I
just couldn’t. And instead of tending to the forest’s needs, I
always found myself distracted by simple things. I loved to
tinker.”

We fall a little behind again, and it makes
me wonder if Tami doesn’t want the boys to hear her story. “One
day, my folks made me cry again, like they did so often when they
weren’t pleased with my inability to fit in. I was so devastated,
that I wished myself away from that place and all the other
pixies.”

My eyes grow big. “And that worked?”

“
I don’t know
how I really did it, but the next thing I know, I was hanging in a
tree with my wings entangled in the twigs and Peter Pan freed me. I
had no idea how to get back to the Pixie Forest, but I didn’t care
about it either. Peter had already decided to never grow up at that
point, and he was alone like me. He said if I stayed with him, he’d
be my family from then on. He’d always take care of me and would
never make me cry.”

“Did he keep his promise?” I ask in a soft
voice, liking her story a lot.

“He did. Until today.”

I force a
smile. “So you really were the first Lost
Girl
.”

“Peter is my family. He and the other Lost
Boys. I’ve never been as happy as I was after Peter Pan took me in.
He was a great big brother, not at all the mean man he has become
lately.”

Silently, I agree with her. Peter has been a
funny and lovely guy when I met him first. The man Jamie and Stan
carry in front of us now has nothing in common with the person he
once was. Growing up so fast did this to him. I feel unspeakably
sorry for Peter Pan.

We walk the rest of the long way in silence.
Toby and Loney take turns in replacing Stan, but Jamie never let’s
go of his brother when asked. He carries him all the way to the
fairies’ house.

Bre’Shun is
at the gate of their small garden and receives us with a concerned
look on her pale face. She urges us inside. No one pays attention
to the beautiful white horse that’s grazing at the back. When it
takes a step forward and eyes us suspiciously, I see the elegant
white horn glimmering in the sunlight. The unicorn inclines its
head as if to greet me. I know I shouldn’t be surprised about
anything that’s happening in this forest, so I respond with a tilt
of my own and follow the others.

The boys lower Peter into the grass and we
all kneel down around him, Tami and I each taking his hand.

“Why did you wait so long?” The fairy with
the golden hair piled on her head narrows her turquoise eyes at
Jamie. “I expected you way sooner.”

Jamie catches his breath after the exhausting
hike. “What do you mean?”

“Look at him. Did you really have to wait
until his heart gives out to think of consulting me?”

I, like everyone else, gaze down at Peter.
His hair is white like snow now. When my grandfather died of a
heart attack at age seventy-eight, he didn’t look as old as Peter.
“Are we too late?” I whisper.

Bre’Shun lowers to her knees next to Jamie,
her long, deep red dress fanning out around her. “Too late for the
cure I could have provided,” she answers with pain in her
voice.

My heart sinks, my throat constricts, cutting
of any air. I shake my head, slowly at first, but then violently,
as I hear the desperate cry of a young pixie next to me.

I KILLED MY brother. The only family I had
left. Peter’s breaths become shallow and they let out for longer
than they should every so often.

“
This can’t
be it! You always know what to do,” I shout at the fairy. In
despair, I grab her shoulders and shake her, growling through
gritted teeth. “Do
something
. Now!”

Bre tilts her head. The look she gives me is
disappointed yet somewhat hurtful. The skin where I’m touching her
glazes over and turns into shockingly cold ice. My hands burn. I
jerk them away, my palms red and marred with angry blisters.

Nostrils flaring, she breathes slowly through
her nose. Her eyes turn a much darker shade of blue. I’m expecting
a thunderstorm to come down on me any minute as we stare at each
other, especially when Remona, who no doubt is having the time of
her life as a unicorn, sidles up to her sister and snuffles in my
face. But nothing happens. Bre’s anger cools off quickly. Or she
warms over…

Her friendly smile returning, she lets go of
a long sigh. “James Hook. Whatever shall I do with you?” She turns
to Peter and strokes her cold hand over his forehead. First I think
that she’s only showing her affection, until I notice how Peter’s
lips suddenly turn blue, his skin pales to whiter than chalk, and
his chest is no longer lifting.

“Stop it!” I shout, reaching out for
Bre’Shun, but Remona nudges my hand away with her horn. “She’s
freezing him,” I argue with the insane horse. “He’ll die.”

“
Peter
Pan
will
die, if we do nothing to stop the ageing process,” Bre
answers to me in her ever gentle voice, her gaze still focused on
Peter. His skin glazes over like Bre’Shun’s did earlier when I
grabbed her so harshly. He turns hard and stiff, his eyes freezing
over, the lids at half-mast.

As the girls start crying, I feel like my
throat tightens too. No matter how hard I swallow, the lump in
there won’t go away. “And now what?” I croak. “Let him vegetate as
a giant icicle?” How is this any better than letting him die?

“Not forever, James Hook. Only until you make
a decision.”

“
What?”
What can
I
do?
Finding Angel’s eyes across my brother’s cold body, I feel how my
bones start to tremble. Which kind of decision could I make that
would save Peter?

Certainly reading my mind again or maybe just
the obvious question on my face, Bre tells me, “The decision of how
much your brother really means to you.”

I turn my head and silently scrutinize the
fairy. Peter means a lot to me. More than I had ever thought was
possible. He’s a part of Neverland. A part of my family…

“If you want to save your brother, things
have to go back to how they were,” Bre explains. “He must, once
again, become the boy who wouldn’t grow. And time will stand still
again.”

“I’m fine with that,” I tell her through a
clenched jaw.

She lifts her brows. “The gates to the other
world will close.”

“I understand.”

“And Angel can’t stay in Neverland.”

No!

I squeeze my eyes shut. This is the only
thing I can’t agree to. I can’t lose Angel again. She’s my
everything. I need her with me.

“
Jamie, he’s
your brother,” Angel whispers and gently takes my hand in hers. I
wonder how much of my thoughts
she
can read.

Sliding my fingers through hers, I shake my
head.

“Please, James, don’t let Peter die,” Skippy
mumbles and all the other Lost Boys lift their pleading gazes to
me. The one looking like she’s aching for Peter the most is the
little pixie. The hope she puts in me constricts my chest.

With a feeling of having rocks tied to my
limbs, I rise from the ground and pull Angel into my arms. I hug
her so hard that I might crack her rib. She pillows her cheek
against my chest and wraps her arms around me with the same force.
This is the place I want to stay for the rest of my life.

But I don’t want my brother to die, and it
means I have to let go of Angel. From what I could read in Bre’s
eyes, this time there won’t be a way to see her ever again. It’s
like the fairies played a cruel joke on me. Tease me with the
biggest adventure, as Bre put it once, and then rip it from my arms
with one snap of her fingers.

But Neverland wouldn’t be the same without
Peter Pan.

I have to choose. My brother. Or my love.

“You love your brother,” Angel whispers in my
ear as she slides her arms around my neck and stands on her
tiptoes. “The same way as I love my sisters. There really isn’t a
choice. Saving Peter is the only thing that counts.”

I bury my face in her hair for a long moment
and savor every second of the time I have to hold her. Her
beautiful scent will be etched to my memory forever as will be the
feeling of embracing her like this.

I know Angel is crying, her tears dampen the
side of my face. For once, I’m glad I’m not looking at her. Or I
wouldn’t be able to hold it together.

Clearing my throat, I lift my gaze to the
fairy and quietly ask her, “What does it take?”

Bre’Shun gets to her feet, smoothing her long
dress. “Someone has to take his years.”

“I will,” Toby blurts out the first, followed
by Skippy’s, “Me, too.”

Each of the Lost Boys enthusiastically offer
to take a share of Peter’s years, so they will all be—what,
twenty-five in the end? Also the pixie volunteers. But Bre’Shun
shakes her head, her gaze filled with compassion.

“No. There’s only one who can do it,” she
says.

Me.

Her eyes find mine. With a nod, I agree.

“Peter gained eighty years, James Hook. Are
you willing to take them all to save your brother?”

Angel stiffens in my arms and everyone on the
ground sucks in an appalled gasp.

Sink me, eighty years.

I’m nineteen. This would be my immediate
death. But, remembering all the things I did to Peter—when he was a
child and later, after I made him break the spell—I know I deserve
it. And living in Neverland without ever being able to see Angel
again is not an option for me anyway.

With my hand in Angel’s hair, I cuddle her to
my chest. She shouldn’t have to see the ache for her in my face
when I tell the fairy with a determined edge to my voice, “All
right. I’ll do it.”

Angel’s chest vibrates against mine. “No,”
she whispers.

I caress her hair and rest my cheek on the
top of her head. The decision has been made. She was right, there
really was no choice from the beginning.

Taking her
face in my hands, I tilt her head up and kiss her on the lips. They
tremble and are wet from her tears, but she never tasted this real
to me before. I know I could have said many things then,
like
I love
you
, or
You’ll always be in my heart
. But
what I really tell her is, “It’s been a pleasure to meet you,
Angelina McFarland.”

Angel says nothing. She only lets me kiss her
again. One last time to remember.

Eventually, my hands drop from her face. I
stroke my palm down the side of her arm and slide my fingers
through hers. Taking a deep breath, then I face the fairy. “Bring
it on.”

Bre gazes at us for a long moment. Something
isn’t right. I can feel it. But she, like Angel, remains silent. In
the end, she kneels down beside Peter and beckons Remona with a
wave of her hand. The other she extends to me. Taking it, I let her
pull me down opposite her.

“Place your hand over Peter’s heart,” she
tells me and guides my hand there. He’s ice-cold. A shudder zooms
through me. “Only the touch of a unicorn’s horn can perform magic
like this.”

Now, aren’t we lucky we have one at hand?
An ironic chuckle dies in my throat.

“Peter will wake up when the transfer has
finished.” Bre turns to look me straight in the eyes. “You don’t
have much time then. If you want to say goodbye to him, do it
fast.”