Captain James Hook and the Siege of Neverland (25 page)

“We’ll put beasts in their way” the mermaid said.
 

“Most of the men have loaded pistols.”

“They will not survive the walk.”
 

“Enough will,” I said.
 

Morgan stepped between us and asked, “You are willing to sacrifice a whole crew to save that one man?”
 

“Yes,” I said to her.
 
“I made a promise.”
 

She looked at me curiously again.
 
“A promise to someone long dead.”

“But not long forgotten.”

Moments passed in silence.
 
I counted the beat silently then said, “Forty-five verses.”

“Enough,” Morgan said.
 
“Yara, go and get this man he is talking about.”
 

The mermaid scowled and struck the water with her fist.
 
She then twisted and dove below.
 

“You’re lying to her,” Morgan said.
 
“You have no intention of leaving.”
 

“She doesn’t know that.”
 

“I would be more careful.
 
The mermaids have become an impressive force in my exile.
 
They used to only be concerned with luxury.
 
Now they are predators.”

“They are merchants,” I said, “and amateurs at that.”
 
I put my hand on my sword and gave Morgan le Fay a wry smile.
 
“A tale from the far east calls them
ningyo
and says that eating one will give a man immortality.”
 

Morgan smiled.
 
“You already have immortality as long as you are in …
Neverland
, I believe you called it?”
 

“That’s Peter Pan’s name for this place,” I said.
 

Morgan le Fay’s smile broadened.
 
“Is that what he calls himself now?
 
Peter
Pan
?
 
Tell me, does he have a council around him?”

“Of sorts,” I said.
 
“They are children as well, mostly runaways and otherwise without homes.
 
He calls them the Lost Boys.”

“The Lost Boys?” Morgan laughed.
 
“Oh how far he has fallen from this father’s traditions.
 
Does he fight?”
 

By reflex, my eyes dropped to my missing hand.
 

Morgan’s laughter quieted to a solemn tone.
 
“Well, I suppose he still has some of his father in him.”
 

“I’m going to kill him,” I said.
 
“Slit him across and watch his guts spill out at my feet.
 
Is this a problem for you, Morgan le Fay?”

She considered my words for a breath.
 
“Perhaps things would go better for you here if you had less ambition.”

The cauldron’s smoke turned red and Morgan hurried to it.
 
She reached in one of the pouches on her belt and sprinkled a black and gold powder into the mixture.
 
She then added a stem and leaf that I didn’t recognize.
 
She caught me watching too closely and a smirk grew on her lips.
 
“I have much to teach you, James Hoodkins, about the ways of this island.”

“It’s alive,” I said, not sure how the idea came to me.
 
Her eyes urged me on approvingly, so I kept talking.
 
“It takes in water and food from its mouth and churns it in a volcanic stomach.
 
It breathes and gives life to others.”
 
My mind raced as each new realization surfaced.
 
“Moreover, it listens.
 
It responds to the wishes of those who are here.”
 

“If you are quiet, you can hear her wishes as well,” Morgan said.
 
She stood watching me for moments as my mind opened further.
 
“Even gods fight.
 
Sometimes they die, sometimes not.
 
She rooted herself here in a suspended life, holding time in place for as long as needed.”

“Like when a man sleeps when recovering from a grave injury.”

“Yes,” said Morgan le Fay with a smile.
 
“Her bones built the foundation of this island.
 
When she rises, the rock and stone will crumble in on itself.”
 

“Killing all who remain?”

“Is that a problem for you, James Hoodkins?”

“Some don’t deserve to die as horribly as they’ve lived,” I said.
 
“How much time are we talking here?”

She placed a hand on her lower stomach again, “Soon.”
 
A bubble grew large in the pot and burst, sending drops over the side of the cauldron.
 
She wiped the edges and stirred again.
 
“We took the baby and followed her here, but her strength is my strength and she was weak then.
 
Fairies stole Peter away at the orders of their king.”

“Their king…” I repeated.
 
“Oberon, your son.”

“That’s right,” she said, smiling again.
 
“Then Bertilak and his fool of a wife bound me to that cell, I don’t know for how long.”

“My guess is anywhere between five to seven hundred years,” I said.
 
Shock ran across her eyes and her face reddened, but I decided to ask my question anyway.
 
“Why did they turn on you?
 
Legend… history tells of their service to you.”
 

“We didn’t know how the island affected the mind.
 
I was immune, but they forgot me along with all of their loyalties.”
 
She stirred more aggressively and repeated, “Five to seven hundred years.”

“Couldn’t you have fixed it with a wave of your hand?” I asked.
 
She looked at me for a moment before figuring out that I was still talking about the
Forgetting
.
 

“It is an effect of her recovery,” she said.
 
“I could no more change it than you could, which makes the mermaids’ ability to trade in it that much more impressive.”

Thousands of questions danced on the edge of my tongue, but a splash washed away the course of our conversation and sprayed water over my shirt and pants.
 

We turned as Yara dropped Billy Jukes in a heap.
 
He coughed and spat water onto the rocks.
 

I walked over and knelt beside my oldest friend.
 
Jukes was heavy, but I managed to help him sit upright.
 
I then looked to Yara.
 
“Make me an offer.”

“We wait you out then skin you all one at a time,” she said.
   

“Enticing,” I said.
 
“But how about this?
 
We walk.
 
All of us.”

“But you now make up more than half of the people on this island,” Yara said.
 
“That would cripple us.”

“Serves you right for trading in what you don’t own,” I scolded.
 
“You see, we don’t need or want you.
 
You want us here, so make me an offer.”
 

The mermaid scowled.
 

“Fine,” she said finally.
 
“You get to keep yours.”

“Permanently,” I said.
 
“Without having to go back.”
 
The mermaid snarled, but I put up my hand and cut her off.
 
“I’m not finished.
 
The men can travel between this world and our own unencumbered by you and your kind.
 
No trances.
 
No interference.
 
If any man suffers a single scratch from your people, I march every one of them through.”
 
I smirked.
 
“That is unless you want to work out an arrangement to entice them not to go, on a man by man basis.”

Morgan le Fay laughed.
 

“You would disgrace us?” the mermaid screeched.
 
She beat at the rock with her fist.
 

“Just engaging in fair trade,” I said mockingly.
 
“You want the men to stay and they want food and comfort, both of which you seem capable of offering.”
 

The mermaid considered it for some time.
 
“No interference,” she said.
 
She then pulled the latched shell from under the water and released the glowing blue orb.
 
It spun in the air for an instant and she gently blew on it, scattering it into nothing along with the light fog that had settled behind my eyes.
 

“Good,” I said.
 
“Now I get one more as well.”
 

“That is not the deal!” the mermaid screamed.

“The deal is whatever I say it is as long as I can leave whenever I please,” I told her.
 
“You are fortunate that I am so generous.
 
Mind you, I will take it all with me when we go, but I still have business to conduct here, so you have time to prepare your market.”
 

“You are a bottom-feeder and you are not fit for my waters,” the mermaid spat.
 
“Who is your other?”

I pointed to Billy Jukes.
 
“You’re looking at him.”
 

“I don’t want it,” Jukes said.
 

My heart dropped into my stomach.
 
Jukes didn’t look at me.
 
He didn’t even look up.
 
“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Just what I said.”
 
The large man stared at the ink on his forearm.
 
“Looking at these tattoos used to hurt.
 
Now they don’t, not as much anyway.”
 
I waited for a longer explanation to come, but none did.
 

“Do you see?” Yara sneered.
 
“You put your men through such pain.”

I waved her words away.
 
“William, think about what you are giving up.”

“I thought about it all the way back from the waterfall,” Jukes said.
 
The large man sat for some time just shaking his head.
 
He then smiled and looked up at me.
 
“It is nearly time to get back to the crew, Captain.
 
Seventeen verses left.”
 

“Wait!” Yara screeched.
 
“You are staying?”

“Yes,” I said.
 
“A deal is a deal.”

“Then who is your one more?”
 

I gave her a name and Billy Jukes laughed from the root of his soul.
 
“He’s going to be pissed.”
 

Yara retrieved the second blue orb and released it as she did before.
 
She glared at me angrily then dove into the water with a huff.
 

I turned to Morgan le Fay.
 
“When should I be back for you?”
 

She smiled.
 
“You are used to women who need you to return for them.
 
You’ll see me when you are needed and not a moment sooner.”
 
Her brusk tone struck in me something I had thought was long dead.
 
I started to say something back, but instead just looked at her.
 
She looked back at me and, in those few seconds, we understood each other completely.
 
She pointed to an opening in the rocky dome and I bowed to her.
   

Billy Jukes and I walked through the narrow passage for several yards until it came to a dead end.
 
Tangled root covered the dirt walls and, just twenty feet above our heads, light shone through.
 
We climbed the root and punched through the dirt to discover that it wasn’t dirt at all.
 
It was sand.
 
We crawled out onto the sandy patch alongside the now-sated plant.
 
I gave one last thought to Bertilak, then led Jukes back to the bay.
 

Chapter Twenty

We got to the bay just as Max Kasey and Robert Mullins loaded the first barrel from Bertilak’s castle.
 
Only one cutter was tied down.
 
The other sailed towards us with Smee at the bow, searching the beach.
 
His eyes settled on me and narrowed.
 
His face flushed red and Smee yelled across the water, “You miserable bastard!”
 

“Good luck with this one,” Jukes said, then went to help Alf Mason load another barrel.

Smee docked the cutter and jumped onto the beach without once taking his eyes off of me.
 
He didn’t give any orders and none of the men paid his anger much attention, maybe because it wasn’t directed at them.
 
He marched over to me with his fists balled.
 

“So, get this, Captain.
 
I’m on the ship loading Long Tom back onto the main deck, which was a bitch of a job thank you, and all of a sudden I see flashes of my father being shot and my mother running me through.
 
Isn’t that the strangest thing, Captain?
 
It plays over and over again in my head.
 
Why is that?
 
I asked myself.
 
Why am I remembering things I clearly said I didn’t want to remember?
 
Do you know why, Captain?”
 

“I need you on point at all times, Smee.”
 

“I don’t want to be
on point
,” Smee said.
 
“I told you that.”

“The
Forgetting
settles in on the men as long as we’re here on the island.
 
We’ll have to take them through the falls every couple of days.”