Unhooked (32 page)

I step back as something within the pile of rags moves again. It can't possibly be the Queen. There is no way this crumpled bit of blackened fabric is what we need to save ourselves and this world.

“Bring the torch.” I turn to Rowan, but before he can reach me, the world explodes in light.

Sometimes, though not often, he had dreams, unlike the other lads who slept deeply, like the dead. On those nights, he could not raise himself from the horrors held in his sleeping hours, though he wailed piteously in them. But when he woke, he could not remember the things he had forgotten. . . .

I
SQUINT AGAINST THE BRIGHTNESS that saturates the cavern, until my eyes adjust to the unnatural glow lighting the space. When I can finally see again, I notice that a figure stands in the center of the crater—a woman.

I know at once I'm in the presence of the Queen. Like Fiona, she is tall and slender, with long, graceful limbs and skin that glows like alabaster. Like Fiona, her face is both beautiful and terrible to behold. Her eyes are alert and, while they are the same deep, glossy black of Fiona's, the irises glow as though they're ringed in fire.

Her voice, when she finally speaks, is also similar to Fiona's, but where Fiona's voice had the threatening buzz of a hive of bees, the Queen's voice is purely feral, wild and almost unintelligible.

The world around us throbs—once, twice—then the steady, heartbeat of the island begins again.

I thought Neverland had been teeming with life before, but I'd been wrong. Now even the air seems alive, brushing against my cold skin like an electric current. Like the world itself is welcoming the Queen back.

Unbidden, a pulse of excitement and anticipation races through me.

The Queen tips her head back and inhales deeply, rolling her neck on her narrow shoulders, stretching and reveling in her new freedom. Behind her a flash appears, like a flame leaping from the ground, and when the light eases, Fiona stands there. Then another flaming column of light, and another of Fiona's brethren appears as well.

Rowan steps forward to protect me, and the movement catches the Queen's attention. She turns her terrible, beautiful face to him, her glossy black eyes narrowed in hate. Her lips pull back, exposing her wickedly sharp teeth, and she lets out a chilling hiss of warning. But before she can strike, she notices me.

Every muscle in the Queen's body goes completely, unnaturally still. For a moment, it looks as though she is a statue carved from alabaster, but then the moment passes, and her expression flashes with such hate, I take an instinctive step back.

“Abomination,” the Queen snarls at me. Then she whips her head around as fast as a snake striking, and steps toward Fiona. “How did
this
come to be in my presence?” she hisses.

Abomination?
I think, my chest tight. I don't know what I expected when we unearthed the Queen, but this is not it.

Fiona bows low. “She was necessary, my Queen,” Fiona explains, more humble than I have ever seen her. If I'm not mistaken, she might even be shaking.

The power in the cavern swells, pulses, until it feels as though a thousand needles are stabbing at me. “And is she still necessary?” the Queen hisses, her voice a dangerously unleashed buzz I feel as much as hear.

Fiona looks up then, a satisfied smile curving at her mouth. “No, my Queen. She is not.”

Rowan takes my hand and begins backing away from the two of them as the Queen turns to me.

This is not how I'd expected her to react. After all, if Fiona is right, I'm her son's daughter—her own blood. “I don't understand. . . .” I whisper. “We freed you.”

The Queen turns back to me in a single fluid movement that exposes her as the predator that she is. “Did you?” she asks, cocking her head at an unnatural angle as her glossy eyes burn into me.

“Aye, she did. In fact, she's risked everything to save you,” Rowan adds, moving closer to me, as though intending to protect me if the Queen decides to strike.

The Queen's eyes flicker to him before coming back to stare at me with unconcealed distaste. “Has she?” the Queen asks, and then her eyes narrow. “Or has she something else in mind. Has she come to do her sire's bidding?”

“I don't even know my father,” I tell her truthfully. “And besides, if Fiona's right, he's your son. Your blood.” Which makes me her blood too.

The Queen's lips pull back into a snarl. “But he was not only of our blood,” she snaps viciously. “Why do you think we cast him out of this world? Why do you think we abandoned him to his fate? The Dark King was his sire.”

I blink, confused. “But you killed the Dark King,” I say, remembering the story that Pan had told me.

“Yes,” the Queen hisses, looking far too pleased with herself. “We did. Because his devotion to us was naught but an act. He promised we would rule this world as one, but we soon enough learned that the Dark King never intended to rule by our side. Once he knew he had a son, he betrayed us. And so, we brought down his reign and made his court our slaves,” the Queen says, smiling that awful smile.

“Why not just kill the child as well?” Rowan asks, pushing me back. He's trying to distract her, to divert the Queen's attention from me.

But the Queen doesn't fall for it. Her cold dark eyes are still on me. “Because the True Child held our own power as well.” The fiery glow in her dark eyes flares as she considers me. “But we could not risk the Dark King's court using our own True Child against us. And so we left him in the world of men, where he was no danger to our rule.”

“The Dark Ones did rise against you, though,” Rowan charges, more desperate now as he pushes me back, away from the Queen and her wicked smile.

Her face flashes with fury, horrible and beautiful all at once. “They shall pay for that, as shall the one who led them,” she growls. “But you shall not be here to witness our final victory.”

Then the Queen turns to Fiona. “Go and prepare the others. We shall finish them, as you should have long ago. Then there is much work to do.”

Fiona hesitates only for a moment before she and the other Fey disappear in a flash of blinding light. It is only us and the Queen now. Instantly Rowan straightens, his hand already on his blade.

“For ages we have been a prisoner in our own world. For so long we have dreamed of this moment, and now it is here. Once we finish with you, my people shall wipe your kind from our world like the vermin they are. And when we have made our world whole again, we shall turn ourselves on yours.”

The prickling sensation sears across my skin in warning as the cavern starts to shake.

“We need to get out of here,” I tell Rowan as chunks of the ceiling begin to fall, but Rowan doesn't move. He's still staring at the Queen in fury. “We
really
need to go,” I repeat, nodding toward the corner of the cavern.

There, at the edges of the Queen's light, shadows are gathering. We are too deep in the ground, and the darkness beyond her glow is too deep, too absolute here. I don't know what the Queen's revelation about my father means for me, but if the Dark Ones feel anything like she does, if they still want to kill us, it will be too easy here, cornered as we are.

“Go?” the Queen says, cocking her head at an awkward angle. “Oh, we think not, Young One.”

Already I can detect the faint sent of mold and rot. Rowan seems to finally have realized what's happening. His hand grabs mine and pulls me back, farther into the cavern, away from the Queen and her threats. Away from the Dark Ones.

Behind the Queen, the shadows have started to climb up the walls, slinking and creeping until they are as tall and wide as a man. But the Queen doesn't notice until the sound of the rushing wind starts to rustle and echo through the cavern.

When she realizes what is happening, her mouth twists into a snarl. “No!” she roars, and the cavern trembles and vibrates with the volume and tenor of her voice.

Behind her, though, the Dark One is fully formed. Its inky black wings unfurl and beat in a steady rhythm that causes a gust of wind to course through the cavern, whipping my hair and clothes.

It isn't alone. All along the cavern walls, more shadows creep and bleed into one another, gathering and swelling. The whole cave is saturated with the smell of them—the dampness of rot, the swirling shuffle of wind rustling. Soon the darkness is rising, climbing up to our knees, up farther then, our waists.

The Queen's eyes meet mine, and there is a look of such pure hate and rage in them that I gasp.
“You,”
she snarls, pointing at me. “You have done this.” Her eyes are wild. “You dare try to rise against us?” She lets out a long, threatening hiss. Suddenly Rowan's arms fall away from me.

Startled, I turn and see that the steel hand Fiona had gifted Rowan with so long ago is at his throat—it looks like he's trying to choke himself. The steel fingers grip, squeezing until the skin under them is red and his face had gone ashen. His other hand is tight on the steel wrist, trying to pull away, but the hand won't release its grip.

The vicious glee that has curved the Queen's terrible mouth tells me she is the one doing this. She has taken the steel fist that is now so much a part of him, and she has turned it against him. I try to help him pull the hand away, but even I can feel how impossible a task it is. The metal fist is too strong, and the hand is too tight around his throat.

He shakes his head, grimacing against the strain of trying to save himself, but his face has gone deathly pale, and the edges of his lips are beginning to turn an unhealthy shade of blue. His eyes are starting to get an unfocused look about them that has me moving before I've realized what I've decided to do.

I press my hands into the wall of the cavern so firmly, I swear my nails are carving out pieces of Neverland's heart. I feel for the pulse of the world beneath my fingers. It's erratic now, a jangling rhythm that feels as unsteady and unmoored as I do. I close my eyes and I
demand
.

When the walls of the cavern begin to vibrate beneath my palms, the Queen's eyes go wide in surprise. I can't stop my own vicious smile as she stares at me. As the caverns start to shake and stones fall from the ceiling. The world quakes at
my
demand, and I feel its pulse singing beneath my hands. Its pulse matches my own—wild and erratic. Answering to
me
. I focus all my pain, all my rage into the rock under my fingertips, and I demand Neverland heed my call.

It happens quickly. The ceiling of the cavern cracks with a deafening sound, and rock pours down over our heads. Rowan is there in an instant, sheltering me with his own body, and I can't be sure if I see a flash of light or if I only imagine it before the cavern collapses around us.

•  •  •

In the silence after the dust settles, I can feel Rowan's weight heavy on top of me, his chest rising and falling with unsteady breaths. “Are you alive?” I whisper, knowing the answer but needing to hear it from his lips.

“Aye, lass,” he says with a groan. “But I'm not sure for how long.” Then I hear his dark, wheezing chuckle tickling at my ear. “You brought the whole bleedin' place down about our ears.”

I shift a bit so his weight isn't crushing me quite so much. “She was killing you,” I whisper into the darkness, stating the obvious. It's the only explanation I can manage. “We have to get out of here,” I say.

He's silent for a long, tense moment, as though he's still waiting for some other explanation. But I don't offer anything more.

It takes us a while to free ourselves from the heaviest of the rubble. The cavern is barely the size of a small room now, but there's still some air moving through it, so even though we can't see past our own noses, we know there must be a way out—if we can just find it.

Rowan makes another torch, and we find the source of the air not much longer after that. With a little effort, we move enough of the boulders away to work free and crawl through the small opening to find ourselves in another cavern.

It's dark here as well, but though we listen and wait, there is no rustling. No smell of old leaves. “Do you think she made it out of there?”

The torchlight flickers over the sharp lines of his face. He looks even more drawn, even more worn-down than before. “Aye. The Fey have a way of getting out of tight spots when they need to.” Frustration flattens his mouth.

“Then we have to go back to the fortress,” I say, the dreadful certainty of it like a stone in my stomach. “We have to warn the others.”

His eyes are pools of fury and pain when they meet mine. “If it's not already too late.”

In that new world, the boy was always happiest right before. When his blood ran cold, when his senses went dull to anything but the moment in front of him. The moment when chance would, by some horrible arithmetic, select the one who could not outrun death. Only then did he feel himself something more than a sack of skin and bone and endless breath. . . .

T
HE TUNNEL EVENTUALLY ENDS AT a place where a small river rushes along underground. A narrow ledge clings to the side of the cavern wall.

“I know this place,” Rowan says, his otherwise exhausted face brightening in relief.

“You do?”

“We're just below the fortress.” He searches the roof of the tunnel. “If we follow this, it will take us to one of the older parts of Pan's fortress.”

Hope sparks in my chest. “Can you get us back there?”

“Aye.” He scrubs a hand through his rumpled hair. “Though I'm not sure what good it will do.”

“If we can get them out before . . .” But I can't finish. Before what? Before the Queen takes back her land? Before she kills us all?