Peter and the Starcatchers (21 page)

—men wearing uniforms, carrying swords. Peter glided close to the hul , keeping his head just below deck level, trying to decide what to do.

It was then that he noticed something disconcerting: he was starting to sink toward the water. It was gradual, and with an effort, he was able to pul himself up again. But it was definitely getting more difficult to stay aloft.

I’m going to have to get back onto the ship,
he thought.
Soon
.

Then he heard Mol y’s voice, shouting, from nearby on the deck.

And then he heard the screams.

B
LACK STACHE WAS FURIOUS.

He and his men had searched belowdecks on the
Never Land,
looking for the treasure trunk. They’d had no luck in the main holds. There were a few trunks, which they’d smashed open with an ax; but these contained only clothing and household goods.

They’d also gone through the cabins, finding a few smal pieces of jewelry in one, but nothing else of value. In the captain’s cabin they’d found a confused man talking gibberish.

There had been one moment of hopeful excitement, when they’d found an aft hold that apparently had, at some point, been padlocked shut. But it was empty.

Now they were back on the main deck. Stache, quivering with rage, wished he could make somebody walk the plank; this usual y had a soothing effect on him. But plank-walking, done right, took time, and Stache did not have time: from the look of the approaching storm, he had only minutes to get off this wretched bucket and make his run.

So, once more, he pressed his pistol to Slank’s forehead.

“Mr. Slank,” he said, “I have no more patience.
Where is the trunk?
”

Slank glared back at him. But Stache caught something in his look…a wavering, perhaps. He curled his finger on the trigger, making the motion elaborate, so Slank could see it. Stache saw a flicker of fear in Slank’s eyes.
He’s about to crack.
..

“Cap’n!” It was Smee, stumbling across the pitching deck, his il -fitting British uniform trousers fal ing to his knees.

“NOT NOW, SMEE!” shouted Stache. “CAN’T YOU SEE I’M ABOUT TO BLOW THIS MAN’S BRAINS OUT?”

“Sorry, Cap’n,” said Smee, yanking his pants up practical y to neck level. “But you said you was looking…”

“I SAID NOT
NOW
!” bel owed Stache, turning his attention back to Slank. “Now, Mr. Slank, I’m going to count to three, and if you don’t tel me where the trunk…”

“Yes!” said Smee. “A trunk!”

Stache whirled to Smee. “YOU FOUND THE TRUNK?”

“Over there, Cap’n! By the starboard rail! There was a canvas over it, and the wind tore it off, and we seen it.” Stache glanced at Slank, and saw in the man’s eyes that this was, indeed, what he was after.

“I’l deal with you in a moment, Mr. Slank,” he said, and strode to the starboard rail.

There he saw it: an old trunk, its wood rough and scarred, nothing like the elegant black trunk he’d found on the
Wasp
fil ed with sand.

Clever,
he thought.
Put the treasure in an old box, and leave it out on deck, where nobody would think to look.

A few feet from the trunk stood a huge man, who was warily watching, and being watched by, a semicircle of pirates, their swords ready. The giant held a young girl—
pretty
young thing,
thought Stache—by her right arm, as if restraining her.

Restraining her from what?
Stache wondered.
And why is she looking at me that way?

But he had no time for the girl, not now, not with the treasure, final y, at hand. His men had left it alone, not daring to approach it before he did.

Stache stepped forward and looked down at the trunk, savoring the moment.
The greatest treasure ever to go to sea.
And it was about to be his!

He leaned forward and touched the trunk lid. As he did, he felt a strange tingle in his hand, then his arm—strange but not unpleasant. He grabbed the latch holding the trunk lid and…

“NO!”

The shout came from the girl, who had managed, somehow, to twist herself free from the grasp of the giant. She lunged toward Stache, her green eyes blazing with fury. Before Stache could react, she had knocked him away from the trunk, her hands clawing at his face. As he tripped and fel onto his back, he screamed in rage, in pain, his screams mingling with the roars of the giant, who had lunged forward to grab the escaping girl, only to be attacked by the pirates who’d been watching him.

Now there were bodies sprawling al over the pitching, rain-slicked deck: Stache, on his back, with the relentless girl stil clawing at his face; the giant, beaten to the deck but stil fighting, his massive thrashing arms and legs knocking down his pirate attackers like bowling pins. More pirates ran toward the commotion, slipping and fal ing as they came.

Slank, temporarily unguarded, also moved toward the starboard rail, and he was among the first to see it—a sight so stunning that, for a moment, al the fighting stopped, as al eyes turned to watch, and there was no sound except the storm.

It was a boy. It was—
But that’s impossible
—the boy Slank had thrown overboard. He was coming back aboard the ship. But he wasn’t climbing the rail; he was
floating,
a good ten feet over the men’s heads as he swooped onto the deck.

The boy was flying.

M
OLLY RECOVERED FIRST. While the others—pirates and non-pirates alike—were momentarily paralyzed by the astonishing sight of the flying boy, Moly roled away from Black Stache and got to her feet, pointing to the trunk and shouting: “PETER! THERE!”

Peter saw it and swooped, landing hard on the deck next to the trunk. He stumbled, then found his feet and threw his arms around the rough wood.

“STOP HIM!” screamed Slank and Stache both, almost with one breath, and a half dozen pirates lunged toward Peter across the rain-slicked deck. But they were just a bit too far away, and Peter was just a bit too quick; he had the trunk on the rail now, and as the closest pirate got to him, he gave it a shove.

“NO!” screamed both Slank and Stache, again sounding almost like one man, as the trunk toppled off the rail and…

…and it did not fal . Instead, it hung in the air next to the ship, then lazily, pushed by the wind, began to drift forward, and ever so slightly downward….

“AFTER IT!” shouted Stache, scrambling to his feet and lunging to the rail, only to find his way blocked again by Mol y.

Who IS this infernal girl?

Hurling Mol y aside, Stache ran along the rail, chasing the trunk, reaching his hand out to grab it, and…

UNNH

Peter, having made a leap that covered twenty feet of deck, slammed into Stache from behind, slamming him forward onto the rail. His hand slapped the trunk, sending it into a lazy spin, the wind carrying it faster now as it twirled gently forward and down, down, to the waiting waves.

With a roar of fury Stache turned and grabbed for Peter, meaning to wring this little flying pest’s neck, for starters. But Peter was again too quick, seeing the pirate’s hands coming and springing backward, his momentum carrying him over the rail, over the side, off the ship. He twisted in the air, angled his body forward, and…

UH-oh
.

Peter felt it immediately: He could no longer make himself rise.

Molly said it wears off.
He was sinking. Not quickly, but there was no question: He was fal ing gently back into the sea. He had time to look back to the deck of the
Never Land,
at Black Stache, screaming in fury; at the pirates, stil battling to subdue the giant Little Richard; at Slank, glaring at Peter with what looked like hatred; and at Mol y, at the rail, her wet hair matted down, her dress torn, watching Peter intently until she knew he saw her, then mouthing something….

Fly,
she was saying.
Fly.

“I CAN’T,” Peter shouted, moving his arms helplessly. “I CAN’T, MOLLY!”

And as he shouted those words, he felt his feet touch the crest of a wave. It passed, but Peter looked down, and saw he would be in the sea soon. He scanned the waves, hoping, desperately, to see the familiar round snout. But Ammm was not there.

Another wave crest, this one hitting his knees, tossing him sideways. The next wave would take him down with it.

Peter looked back up at the
Never Land,
hoping for a last look at Mol y. But she wasn’t where she had been. Frantical y, Peter ran his eyes along the ship. Then he saw her: she was at the bow. She had climbed up on the rail, and was balanced, precariously, as the ship tossed. Behind her, Mrs. Bumbrake was shrieking; men were running toward Mol y. But it was too late.

Mol y jumped into the sea.

B
LACK STACHE WAS IN A DARK RAGE. The treasure had been in his hands—
in his hands
—and now it was in the sea, thrown there by a boy. A
boy.
Stache had always disliked boys, and the fact that this one had appeared to be flying made him even more unappealing in the pirate’s eyes. Stache had seen many things in his pirate career, but never a flying person, and, even in the wild confusion on the wave-washed deck of the
Never Land,
it nagged at him.

Maybe he wasn’t really flying. Maybe it was a trick played by the wind.

Whatever the explanation for the boy, Stache was sure it had something to do with the trunk. Which was now in the sea. This fact made Black Stache so angry he could barely think. He wanted very much to soothe his nerves by kil ing somebody, perhaps several people, ideal y including a boy. But there simply wasn’t time. The
Never Land
was pitching and heaving in twenty-foot seas, riding up one gigantic wave and then slipping down the backside only to be caught by the next and lifted again. Towering wal s of foaming seawater crashed over both ships from al directions; Stache knew he had to cut the
Never Land
loose from the
Jolly Roger
before the ships smashed each other to bits.

“Back to the
Jolly Roger,
men!” he shouted over the roar of the wind. The pirates, eager to escape the
Never Land,
began leaping from one pitching deck to the other, taking whatever valuables they’d been able to scrounge from the
Never Land,
including a very alarmed pig.

“Cap’n,” shouted Smee. “What about prisoners?”

“We’l take the giant,” replied Stache, gesturing to Little Richard, who’d final y been subdued by six pirates and was lying, beaten and bound, on the deck. A man like that could be useful, once he’d learned to obey.

“Take the woman, too,” said Stache, pointing to Mrs. Bumbrake. It was Stache’s policy always to take women, although this one was quite large. But a woman was a woman, the way Stache looked at it. The large woman had been sobbing uncontrol ably since the girl had jumped into the water. Stache wondered about that, too—why a girl would do such a thing.

It had something to do with that trunk,
he thought, and that reminded him of something.