by Kara Swanson
I’m the only one who can stop him. I weigh the little bag of pixie dust in my palm and then gaze down at Claire.
“I’m sorry, Pixie-Girl,” I tell her. “I have to help Lily with Shadow.”
This reflection of myself. The me I used to be.
The me I would have become if it weren’t for her.
I realize just how much I owe this girl. But, it’s more than that—
Much, much more.
I take a ragged breath and gently brush her hair out of her eyes. The scent of metallic blood clings to the air, and far too much crimson stains the ground and her hair and our clothes. I lean forward and whisper only for her to hear.
“I love you, Claire Kenton. I should have said so a whole blooming lot earlier. I love you.” Tears stream down my cheeks again. I press a “thimble” against her lips, the kiss hesitant and wet with my weeping. “I’d gladly grow old with you if we could.”
And I mean it. More than I’ve ever meant anything before.
I cup her face with one hand, touching her one last time, and then I reluctantly ease away. I get back on my feet and start toward Tiger Lily.
I untie the string on the Hook’s pouch and drizzle out the pixie dust into my hands. My chest feels like a gaping, raw wound, which is made more painful as I see the soft glimmer of Claire’s dust filtering through my fingers, lifting me from the ground.
I glide over beside Lily. From the way her arms droop, she’s exhausted. Shadow focuses on me, growling I nudge Lily’s shoulder.
“I’ve got this.”
She drops her staff on the ground. Her brown eyes glisten. “I’ll stay with Claire.”
I can only nod.
I brace myself opposite Shadow. “This is between us.”
Before he can respond, though, I hear a weird guttural moan from behind us. Both Shadow and I turn to look, and I realize that Hook has stepped up close to Paige. And she’s stumbled into his arms, shaking.
“You can’t leave. It’s impossible now, love,” he’s telling her, and I’m surprised at how gentle his voice is. He rubs her back with the curve of his hook. “Stay with me, love? Stay here? Try again?”
But Paige is shaking her head. A wail tears from her throat. “I can’t. It’s too much, James. I want to escape.”
Her eyes are wild, and she’s grasping at him, at his grimy and torn undershirt, reaching for something tucked in an inside pocket. Hook’s mouth parts, but no words surface, and he instead grabs her shaking, desperate hands and pulls her in close. He holds her for a long moment, so quiet, then whispers something in her ear.
She nods.
And he pulls a slender vial out of his pocket. A curving silver snake makes up the tight cork of the bottle, and a deadly familiar green liquid sloshes about inside.
Before that can fully sink in, Shadow attacks again.
I leap into the air, letting Claire’s dust lift me higher and higher. Shadow starts to follow and then stops. Without warning, he darts across the ground toward Hook. The pirate captain grabs his pistol and raises it. But Shadow isn’t interested in Hook. Instead, the ghastly thing grabs onto the large, curved sword stabbed into the ground. Before the pirate can react, Shadow snatches the sword and heads back to me, dragging the clattering weapon behind him.
I draw him away from everyone else. It’s chilling how fast he is, keeping up with me over ground as I travel above.
I don’t know how to undo any of this. I’m not sure of anything anymore.
Even if I manage to destroy my shadow and the darkness along with it, it won’t bring my Pixie-Girl back.
But still I fly. I soar back over the island, past the stretch of what was once rich jungle where the hanging villages were but is now only collapsed trees. I halt midair at their splintered remains. Jagged pieces of wood and collapsed roofing are all stained red. My gut turns when I see hundreds of bodies strewn among the fallen villages. The village has crushed everyone under the trees. Lily’s brave warriors surrounding the star were only set in place for their own deaths.
I don’t know how Lily even survived.
If that’s what you can call any of this. It doesn’t feel like survival.
It feels like a waking sort of death. I falter. I can’t take anymore.
But I catch a gleam of Claire’s pixie dust around me and continue on.
I aim right, veering away from the jungle, Shadow staying close, skimming over the charred ground. As I see the edge of the island, I realize that Neverland has split right down the middle. Water bubbles through the massive crack in the dry ground.
But it’s not normal Neversea water.
This water is dark and murky with half-fish, half-human bodies afloat in it. Sirens. Dozens of them. The crocodile has washed up on one of the rocky shores.
Dead. Dead. Dead.
All of it.
The word hammers through my chest, and I drop out of the sky. I can’t find a happy thought. I fall toward the splintered world below, toward the shadow that is skittering across the ground and dragging Hook’s blade with him.
“Not like this!” I moan hoarsely. That fragment of a thought is enough to help me fly again. The sky is overcast, angry storm clouds blocking out the stars, and suddenly I hear the cannon of thunder. Lightning streaks across the clouds.
Just perfect.
I shoot out past Neverland just as the first big raindrops start to fall.
I swivel, hovering over the Neversea, watching Shadow pause at the border of the water. And then I sight what I was looking for. Skull Rock, just to the right of us, is mostly submerged and tipped on its side. But a large pirate ship has been thrown against it by the raging, crashing waves hammering at the island.
The Jolly Roger is a shattered wreck. Its sails are ripped and mostly gone. There’s a massive hole in its hull that is quickly taking on water, and a few of the masts are splintered and lopsided.
But the main mast still stands with a few lengths of rigging.
It’s enough.
I head toward the Roger, soaring quickly over the angry, rocking sea. A glance over my shoulder shows that Shadow has somehow managed to follow, cutting across the waves, albeit slower. I land on one of the Roger’s crossbeams just shy of the very top of the mast. My feet fight for purchase on the wet, splintered wood. I grab onto a length of salt-crusted rope and hold on to the rigging to stay in place. Claire’s dust still flecks my body, and a few specks still fill the air around me, but the rain is driving some of it away.
As the heavy downpour batters against me, I watch as Shadow climbs up the side of the hull, up over onto the deck, and then starts to streak up the mast toward me. He’s shorter than I am, with an outline of thick unruly hair and a lanky, boyish frame.
A reflection of the Peter who swore he’d die before he’d grow up.
Shadow is here to make good on that promise.
I brace myself as I watch him climb. Hook’s sword is clenched in Shadow’s teeth. Dark magic drips from Shadow’s wavering form, and charred veins spread out across the ship.
I have no idea how to stop this thing. He’s me—he knows every move I make. And he’s filled with dark magic. If Claire’s light couldn’t even destroy the dark magic, what am I supposed to do?
But as the rain beats down on me, and lightning flashes through the sky, brightening the skeletal Jolly Roger, there is one thing I do know.
If Peter Pan is going to die with this Neverland—
It’s going to be by fighting until my last breath.
Neverland
The rain pounds down on me like a hail of bullets, the sky lanced by lightning and thunder that shakes the splintered mast I’m perched on.
My grip on the rough wood is slippery. As another vault of thunder rumbles through the shipwrecked vessel, I continue to watch the dark figure scaling up the wood.
Shadow has Hook’s sword clenched between his teeth like some blooming pirate, and his lithe form is so quick he’s only a foot below me. He takes a swin
g with the sword, and I jump out of the way, landing on one of the remaining crossbeams. Weathered strips of rigging snap and sway in the harsh wind, and the entire ship creaks loudly.
Shadow clambers up onto my section of wood and sweeps the sword again. I dance backward until my heels are hanging off the end of the beam. I’m armed with the remnants of Claire’s pixie dust but no physical weapons. The little devil scampers across the beam at me, sweeping and slicing the sword like a child with an oversized plaything—and he’s blinkin’ fast.
I narrowly manage to jump and duck around him. Using the dust still clinging to my clothes and lightly flickering nearby, I vault through the air to land behind Shadow. I hurriedly climb back down the mast, searching for something to fight with.
There’s some large chunks of wood and the fraying strips of rigging, but nothing that would hold out against Hook’s sword.
Shadow is already on my heels, and I almost think I hear a wild little boy’s laughter in the wind. It’s chillingly eerie the way he moves in exact reflection of my movements. I step, he steps. I go to jump, he’s poised to follow.
Shadow lurches toward me, ramming Hook’s long cutlass right at my chest, but I expect it. It’s the exact move I would have made. I leap into the air, use the last of Claire’s dust to give me a few more inches, and grab onto a long stretch of rigging. I swing on the rope, crashing back to kick at Shadow’s hand, trying to dislodge the sword. He doesn’t quite lose his grip, but the move surprises him just enough that I can pull off what I try next. My feet skid across the thick crosspiece of the mast, the rope in one hand. I quickly swing it around Shadow’s small fist. Once, twice, so fast he can’t react—and then I pull it tight.
Shadow, drops the sword, hand caught in the rope and wrenched to the side by a gust of wind. I quickly grab Hook’s sword before it tumbles over the edge. I place the end of the long blade against Shadow’s thin chest.
“Give it up, mate! You’ve lost.”
Shadow goes very still, and then he lifts his head. His dark eyes narrow at me, teeth bared, and then he lets out a guttural growl.
Shadow wrenches his arm out of the rigging and launches at me. I try to swing the sword at him but it doesn’t seem to affect him.
Blast, blast, blast!
Another burst of thunder and lightning severs above. Shadow jumps at me, clawing at me with his fists. Using my hand to protect my face, I thrash at him with the sword, though it obviously can’t do a blithering thing.
Shadow screeches again with a lunge, and suddenly the sword is out of my hand. The darkness from his feral little body seems to lash out at me, dripping down the mast and spreading like spindly veins across the ship. The Roger creaks as the whole ship begins to collapse inward. It’s slowly breaking apart and bending in on itself and almost knocks me out of the rigging in the process.
The waves slamming against the hull are growing even wilder. Neverland is coming apart at the seams. Crumbling without the pulse of a heartbeat. Without being connected to anyone. Just as the Jolly Roger is splintering and sinking and close to collapse, this island won’t last much longer.
I back up on the shuddering beam, trying to get out of the way as Shadow reclaims the sword. He lifts the weapon and I realize he’s pushed me to the very edge. I’m practically on my back, hands pressed against rough wood to keep from slipping. A glance over my shoulder only reveals the splintered, jagged remains of the deck caving upward.
Not a fun fall.
My head turns back to see Shadow standing over me, the sky splitting with a bolt of lightning that reflects off the blade he’s holding to my throat.
“Whoa, now—”
My boyish reflection parts its thin, stained lips and mouths three words:
No grown-ups here.
I meet the shadowy eyes of the boy who was once Peter Pan. “I’ve always thought to die would be quite the adventure.” I force myself to stare at him, watching until the last minute. I’m many things, but a coward was never one of them. “And at least now I’ll get to see Claire. She gave everything because she believed in this island.” The words catch in my throat, but I have to get this out if it’s the last thing I ever say. “Because she believed in me. And if that means I have to fight for our world until my last breath”—I lift my chin, wild determination filling each word—“do your worst.”
Shadow snarls. I flinch but don’t look away, preparing for the final blow.
Then suddenly something ripples through the whole island. It shakes the ship and skims across the frothy water, making even Shadow stumble back a step.
I hold my breath, listening. Every fiber of my being straining . . .
And I feel it. It’s faint, but it’s growing. The gentlest whisper of a pulse, beating through the island. Humming beneath my palms. Filling my own veins, moving in time to my heartbeat.
My eyes shoot wide. Is it possible?
Unease is on Shadow’s vague features. There is a flicker of fear. Then panic as he tries to run at me again.
But he’s too slow.
And the island is blooming to life.
By the stars, we’re alive.
I duck under the sweep of Shadow’s sword. It glances off the edge of my shoulder, but I don’t even feel it. I race across the beam and brace myself with my back against the thick curve of the mast. The icy weight in my chest thaws out as I watch the island begin to thaw too.
The rain slows and settles, and the dark storm clouds are cut through with vibrant shafts of sunlight. The writhing, angry sea slows its vicious beating against the wrecked ship and soothes back into the soft whisper of waves against the rock.
I watch Neverland inhale.
I know what comes next.
From the terror on Shadow’s face and the way the darkness is filling the air around him like a seeping mist, he does too.
But he’s too late.
And I’m not alone. I can feel it in the pulse that hums through my bare feet and sings a quiet song across the wind and the whisper of hope in the air. It’s not only my pulse filling this island, knitting it back together. Waking it back to life.
Lily said there was another way to form a bond with a Never Never Land.
Deeper than any other.
Born out of a deep sacrifice.
Stitching your soul to another’s—and to a place.
Please, please, please . . .
The word chants through my head as I hold my breath, gaze locked on the shore of Neverland. I watch the island groan and rock and start to come back together and watch the sun begin to rise. Only it’s not the sun.
The ball of light lifts above the tropical foliage that has begun to regain its color, and my mouth opens from just how stunningly bright it is. She is. A vibrant light, shimmering gold but with an almost pink hue, sweeps across the shore of Neverland and flies out over the sea. I see a small foot skim the top of a wave, watch streams of shining dust spill behind her, and then she’s close enough that I can make her out.
There is a young woman shining at the center of the blast of light. Her skin is practically glowing, and the rosy color of dust spills from her, pixie dust brighter and more glorious than I’ve ever seen. It’s like her magic has been fully let loose, rippling her body in a kind of shimmering dress that leaves a wave of shining magic in her wake.
Claire’s hair is flowing free around her face, and her blue eyes are sparkling with life.
Shadow suddenly screams. He goes into motion and charges me, but he’s afraid. I can feel it. When he swings, I just jump off the beam.
Claire’s dust catches me. Even though she’s still a few feet away, she’s creating so much vibrant, rosy dust I’m swept up in the air. Facing Shadow, I wave a hand. “I guess this place can still do the impossible after all.”
Shadow hisses, and the darkness oozes out even wider as more dark veins shoot across the wood and drip toward the deck below. Claire glides through the air to me.
I grin at her like a blithering idiot. �
��I love you.”
She almost drops, but her eyes shine.
She places a foot on the beam, inches from Shadow, and the darkness suddenly recoils. The dust that cascades down her body like a waterfall spills over the side of the beam, and Shadow screeches, reeling back until he’s the one standing at its very end. I plant both my fists on my hips and stare at my darker reflection. The little boy who had spent so long hiding in the light of the stars, only to find that the darkness was inside him all along.
But not anymore.
“Don’t you see? The shadows will never win.” I tip my head back and let out a long crow. “Not so long as there’s faith, trust, and . . .”
“And pixie dust.” Claire comes right up to Shadow.
She kicks the sword out of his hands. “Fear and darkness have already done far too much damage to this island. No longer.”
Shadow hisses, the darkness clawing out from him and trying to snap at her, but the rosy dust pushes it back. Claire glances at me floating in the air beside her. “You know what I’ve learned in all this? My pixie dust doesn’t just create light.” She puts her hands together and creates a thick ball of shining dust. She fixes a fiery gaze on Shadow, and the swelling dark magic clinging to him like a cloud. “My dust is also a weapon.”
She throws the large ball, and it explodes over Shadow, cascading across his body. He shrieks, clawing at himself and at the shining dust that clings to the planes of his form and soaks into the snapping and sizzling dark magic.
Claire leaps off the beam and grabs my hand. We hover together above the Jolly Roger and watch as the darkness seeps out of Shadow and grows so large that I can’t even see a trace of my silhouette anymore, just a thick haze.
Claire creates another ball of dust and hurls it at the haze of darkness. Then another, and another, and another. Until her pixie dust completely covers and coats and sinks through the sizzling blackness. Claire lifts her hand as she observes the pixie dust mingling with the oozing darkness, its threads of light cutting through the black.
“This is our Neverland.” She clamps the hand into a tight fist.
