by Kiki Thorpe
Copyright © 2019 Disney Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Random House Children’s Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, 1745 Broadway, New York, NY 10019, and in Canada by Penguin Random House Canada Limited, Toronto, in conjunction with Disney Enterprises, Inc. Random House and the colophon are registered trademarks and A Stepping Stone Book and the colophon are trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
Trade Paperback ISBN 9780736439558
Ebook ISBN 9780736439565
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Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Introduction
Map
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
About the Author
Far away from the world we know, on the distant Sea of Dreams, lies an island called Never Land. It is a place full of magic, where mermaids sing, fairies play, and children never grow up. Adventures happen every day, and anything is possible.
Though many children have heard of Never Land, only a special few ever find it. The secret, they know, lies not in a set of directions but deep within their hearts, for believing in magic can make extraordinary things happen. It can open doorways you never even knew were there.
One day, through an accident of magic, four special girls found a portal to Never Land right in their own backyard. The enchanted island became the girls’ secret playground, one they visited every chance they got. With the fairies of Pixie Hollow as their friends and guides, they made many magical discoveries.
But Never Land isn’t the only island on the Sea of Dreams. When a special friend goes missing, the girls set out across the sea to find her. Beyond the shores of Never Land, they encounter places far stranger than they ever could have imagined….
This is their story.
“There’s Tinker Bell! I see her!” With a shout of excitement, Gabby Vasquez plunged into the shallow river. She splashed through knee-deep water toward the reeds on the other side.
Gabby’s older sister, Mia Vasquez, and their friends Kate McCrady and Lainey Winters waited on the bank with four fairies. They all watched as Gabby parted the reeds.
A startled duck flapped into the air.
“Never mind!” Gabby turned to wade back. “It was just a duck.”
Kate arched an eyebrow. “No kidding.”
“It sure looked like Tinker Bell, though,” Gabby added as she climbed, dripping, onto the bank.
They were searching for the fairy Tinker Bell. Their journey had taken them from Never Land to the strange Shadow Island. After days of looking, the fairy Fawn had finally spotted Tink’s boat by a waterfall. But the boat was gone before they could catch up with it. Now they were following the river downstream, hoping it would lead them to her.
Gabby had her own reason for wanting to find Tinker Bell. The Treasure, the toy boat Tink was sailing, belonged to her family. Her great-grandfather had made it, and Gabby had promised Papi she would bring it home safe and sound.
But looking hard for something can play tricks on your mind. The longer Gabby searched for Tink, the more she thought that she saw her everywhere. Just that day, she’d mistaken a goldfinch for the fairy’s golden glow. A glimmer Gabby was sure was Tink had turned out to be a large dragonfly. And now the duck.
Fawn, the animal-talent fairy, shook her head. “Sorry, Gabby, but how could you mistake a duck for Tinker Bell?”
“Well, Tink is in a boat,” Gabby replied. “And the duck was the same size as the boat. And its feathers were sort of greenish, and…” She trailed off. They were all staring at her.
“Um, they both float?” she finished meekly.
“Gabby,” Mia said with a sigh, “that’s the third wild-goose chase today.”
“Don’t you mean a wild-duck chase?” Kate said with a smirk.
Mia rolled her eyes. “I’m serious. Gabby, you have to stop messing around. At this rate, we’ll be going in circles on Shadow Island forever.”
“I wasn’t messing around,” Gabby muttered.
“Just do us a favor,” Mia said. “Next time, don’t yell ‘Tinker Bell’ unless you’re sure it’s her.”
Gabby pressed her lips tight together. She hated it when Mia talked down to her, especially in front of the fairies. Of course she wouldn’t yell “Tinker Bell” unless she was sure! Or, at least, really and truly almost sure. Did they think she was making stuff up on purpose?
Gabby scowled at the reeds where the duck had been hiding. “Dumb duck,” she grumbled.
Silvermist, the water-talent fairy, eyed Gabby’s soaked tutu. “You’ve probably washed off your fairy dust. You’ll need more to fly.”
Silvermist didn’t sound upset, but Gabby heard the gentle reprimand. She knew that they were trying to save fairy dust. The fairy dust allowed them all to fly, and it gave the fairies their magic. But they only had a small supply. They’d already learned the hard way that they had to make it last.
“It’s okay,” she said quickly. “I can walk.”
Gabby glanced at the other fairies to make sure they’d heard. But they weren’t paying any attention. They were huddled over the map of Shadow Island. Their wings gently stirred the air as they studied it.
“What I don’t understand is where else she could be,” Fawn said. “This is the only river. I can’t believe Tink is that far ahead of us.”
“Maybe there’s a branch of the river that we missed,” Rosetta, the garden-talent fairy, suggested.
Iridessa, the light-talent fairy, eyed the dark clouds gathering on the horizon. “I’m worried about those thunderheads. What we should be looking for is a place to get out of the rain,” she said.
Gabby tried to look over the fairies’ shoulders at the map. But they glanced up, frowning.
“Sweet girl, would you mind stepping back? You’re casting a shadow,” Rosetta said.
“Sorry.” Gabby moved away.
With nothing better to do, she sat down beside the stream. The water made a pretty sound as it ran over the rocks. Tiny fish darted in the shallows.
Gabby watched as a small dark shape flitted over the surface of the water. It disappeared into the reeds on the other side of the stream.
Gabby had seen it before. It looked like a small bird or a large moth. Whatever it was, it had been following them for a while.
“There’s that moth again,” she announced to no one in particular.
No one gave any sign that they’d heard her.
Gabby watched the reeds. A moment later, the moth appeared again a short distance away. It has an odd shape, Gabby thought. It was not really mothlike at all. In fact, it looked a little like a fairy.
She opened her mouth to say so, then thought better of it. “Sure is a funny-looking moth, though.”
Fawn finally glanced up from the map. “Moth?”
“Never mind. It’s gone.” Gabby looked toward the trees where the moth had disappeared. Beyond the tree branches, she spied som
ething she hadn’t noticed before.
Gabby squinted at it. “Hey,” she said.
“I think I saw a cave a little ways back,” Kate was saying. “We could wait out the storm there.”
“Hey, guys,” Gabby said again.
“Maybe we’re better off stopping here for the night,” Fawn said. “We could find a tree to shelter under.”
“Or,” Gabby said loudly, “we could try that castle.”
This time, they all looked up. “What castle?” asked Kate.
“There.” Gabby pointed. Rising above the trees was a tall stone tower.
The castle sat in a clearing, overlooking the sea. It was very old. Whole sections of it had collapsed. The walls that remained were weather-beaten and spotted with lichen. The tower they’d seen through the trees was so covered in vines it looked as if it had grown up from the earth, like some sort of ancient tree.
And yet, the sunlight breaking through the clouds struck the castle with a golden light, so that the stones seemed to glow. To Gabby and her friends, peering from the edge of the forest, the castle looked like something straight out of a fairy tale.
“It’s abandoned,” Mia said. She sounded both disappointed and relieved.
“Maybe, maybe not,” Lainey whispered. “There could be a magical princess asleep in that tower.”
Gabby looked up, her eyes widening “Really?”
Lainey smiled. “I was only kidding, Gabby.” She glanced back at the castle, then added, “Sort of,” under her breath.
“What are we waiting for?” Kate said. “Come on. Let’s check it out!”
“Hold on.” Mia caught Kate’s sleeve before she could rise into the air. “What if it’s haunted?”
“Let’s hope it is,” Kate replied with a devilish grin. “That will make things even more interesting.”
She flew off toward the castle. After a moment’s hesitation, Mia, Lainey, and the fairies followed.
“Wait for me!” Gabby cried, chasing after them. Without fairy dust, she had to run to keep up.
Halfway across the clearing, they came to a great stone archway. It had clearly once been some sort of gateway or entrance. But the wall that had held it was long gone. Now only the arch remained.
Kate, Mia, Lainey, and the fairies flew right over it without stopping. But to Gabby, standing below, the arch made a grand impression. She paused before it.
The low sun was behind her. It cast the shadow of the arch across the ground. Gabby could see her own shadow framed within it. The wings she always wore looked almost real, as if she were truly a fairy.
Gabby started forward. But just as she was about to pass beneath the arch, something flitted past her face, making her draw up short.
That strange moth again! What was it doing here?
The moth had disappeared. But a moment later it was back. This time it flew so close it nearly brushed her nose.
“Hey! Buzz off!” Gabby waved a hand, trying to swat it away. Why was it bothering her?
“Gabby!” Mia called. She was standing near the main part of the castle. Lainey and Kate had already disappeared inside. “Are you coming?”
“Yes!” Gabby ran toward her.
As Gabby stepped through the arch, she felt a gentle snap, as if something stretched tightly had broken loose. In the same instant, a strange feeling came over her. A sad, anxious feeling, as if she’d lost something important.
She checked the pockets of the shorts she wore under her tutu. She felt for her fairy wings on her back. Everything seemed to be in place. But the strange feeling did not go away.
“Gabby?” Mia was starting to sound impatient.
“Coming!” Gabby brushed off the feeling, and ran to join her friends.
She found Mia standing before a crumbling entryway. Up close, the castle looked even more desolate. Most of the roof was gone, and whole walls were missing. Weeds grew where the floors had been. The tower was the only section that hadn’t crumbled. The vines appeared to be holding it together.
“Who do you think lived here?” Lainey asked as they wandered among the empty rooms.
“Kings and queens, obviously,” Mia said. “Probably a whole royal court.”
“But that’s what’s so strange,” Lainey replied. “We haven’t seen any people on Shadow Island. So what happened to them?”
“Maybe they got tired of living here and moved somewhere nicer,” Kate said.
“Like Florida,” said Gabby. “That’s where the Johnsons moved when they got tired.”
“You mean, RE-tired.” Mia gave her a look. “Kings and queens don’t move to Florida. Florida didn’t even exist when this place was built.”
“I know what Gabby means, though,” Kate said. “If you spent your whole life on Shadow Island, you’d probably really want to retire somewhere else.”
They climbed through the ruins, scrambling over old walls and through narrow passageways. There was no trace of whoever had lived there. But it was thrilling to imagine that kings and queens had once passed exactly where their feet were walking now.
Navigating through the ruins was a little like being in a maze. Soon Gabby lost sight of Mia and the older girls. As she came around a corner, she saw Iridessa hovering near a window, frowning.
“What’s wrong?” Gabby asked.
Iridessa jumped, as if she’d been deep in thought. “Oh, nothing, Gabby. I was just looking at the light. Something’s not right here, don’t you think?”
Gabby looked out the window. She didn’t see anything strange. “I’m not sure.”
“Maybe it’s nothing,” Iridessa said. “I’m probably just—”
Suddenly, a scream echoed across the castle grounds. Iridessa gasped.
“That sounded like Mia!” Gabby exclaimed.
They raced toward the sound. Outside the exterior castle wall, they spotted a small building shaped like a beehive. Mia came bursting out the door of it, waving her hands over her head.
“Ugh!” she cried. “They were everywhere!”
“What was?” Lainey asked. She’d come running up with the rest of the fairies.
“Bats.” Kate emerged from the little building Mia had just come out of. “This place is full of them.”
“Bats? Is that all?” Fawn snorted. “The way you were screaming, I thought you’d met a ghost.”
“They were in my hair!” Mia touched her thick black curls and shuddered. She turned to Kate. “You told me there would be doves in there.”
“Well, it’s called a dovecote. I learned about it in a book on castles. There were doves in there, once upon a time,” Kate said with a shrug. “I guess when the doves moved out, the bats moved in.”
“I want to see them!” said Lainey, who adored animals of every kind. She started toward the squat little building. But Fawn stopped her.
“No, don’t. You’ll upset them more. Mia probably already scared them half to death with her screaming,” the animal-talent fairy said.
“They scared me half to death,” Mia replied.
Kate glanced toward the dovecote. “Don’t look now, but they’re coming back for revenge.”
“Very funny,” Mia said. But the words were barely out of her mouth when a small, winged shape darted through the air over her head. Another was right behind it.
“Eeee!” Mia screamed, and flapped her arms again. “Help! The bats are coming to get me!”
“Stop screaming,” Fawn commanded. “They’re not coming to get you. They’re coming to get their dinner. Look.”
More bats were flying out of the low door of the dovecote. At the same moment, the girls noticed that the sun, which seemingly moments before had been in the sky, was slipping below the horizon. They heard a rumble of thunder.
“Now what are we going to do?” Silvermist asked.
“Wel
l,” said Kate, “I have always wanted to sleep in a castle.”
From a castle window, Iridessa watched a flock of crows. They were circling above the forest, just beyond the castle grounds.
Iridessa could tell they were crows by their color—the birds were black as night. Still, there was something odd about them.
Not just odd. Wrong, Iridessa thought. Something about the birds didn’t look right.
“Fawn,” she said, “do you see those crows over there?”
Fawn looked where Iridessa was pointing. “They don’t look like crows.”
Iridessa nodded. “But why not?”
“They’re too fat. And their heads are too round. They look more like pigeons to me,” Fawn said.
Ah, that was it. They were the wrong shape. “And another thing,” Fawn went on. “Crows are noisy. These birds haven’t made a sound.”
“So they’re pigeons, then?” Iridessa asked.
“Maybe.” Fawn looked unsure. She glanced at Iridessa. “What’s bothering you?”
“This place is bothering me,” Iridessa admitted. “But I can’t put my finger on why exactly. It’s just a…”
She was about to say “a gut feeling.” But she stopped herself. Normally, Iridessa didn’t put any stock in gut feelings. She was not a superstitious fairy. She didn’t believe in fables or myths. Of course, she had magic like any fairy. But it was sensible magic. A light fairy’s gift was for shining light in the darkness, for making things clear and bright. The only gut feeling she paid any attention to was the grumbling of her empty stomach.
But when Iridessa thought of spending the night in the castle, the uneasy feeling only grew stronger.
“It’s just that it’s cold,” Iridessa told Fawn, “and dark.” Compared to sleeping under the stars, the castle seemed chilly and bleak.
The girls, however, all seemed thrilled at the prospect of sleeping in the tower. “A castle slumber party!” Mia exclaimed.
